OWCA Academy - The Field Test
by Eris Perap
Summary: The Agency has sent away the young agents in the wild to test their skills in field work. Will Perry and his friends managed to get through the dangerous areas and solve all the obstacles with their lives still in behold? This is a sequel to "O.W.C.A. Academy", but you don't necessarily have to have read it to keep up with this story.
1. The First Obstacle

_O.W.C.A.'s Field Test:_

_The purpose of this test is to give the agents the opportunity to demonstrate skill, strength, intelligence and cooperation in various conditions. This by together __in a group of five __trying to solve various tasks._

_The teams must together get to the set positions where they will encounter a special box that contains instructions for the next station. The way to each station is lined with different obstacles and quests. The boxes can only be opened if all agents in the group manage to solve the task. There is a total of five stations for each team._

_Everyone in the group will, right before the test starts, be provided with a special kind of bracelet, anklet or similar (depending on the wearer's exterior), which contains a unique code. To open each one of the five boxes all five codes must be registered at the same time._

_Good luck on the test agents!_

* * *

**1\. The First Obstacle**

"Did we _have to_ choose to go this way?" Pinky questioned annoyed while we splashing waded our way through the scrubby swamp. It was times like these that I wished I had longer legs. The others could at least lift their feet above the muddy water surface, while I, however, almost had to swim to move forwards.

"This is the shortest way", Darren, who was carrying the map, reminded right in front of me. "We _do_ want to get there as quick as possible, right?"

"Um, if I remember correct, it did not say anything in the description about this test being clocked", Terry said a few feet behind me.

"Well… no, but it doesn't hurt to try to hurry up a little", the duck thought and held a protruding branch out of the way with one wing in front of him. I had expected that he would hold it there for a while until I had passed by, but without taking a look back he immediately let it go instead.

The leafy twigs came whizzing towards me at great speed and I instinctively ducked to avoid them.

"OUCH!" I heard someone scream right behind me and when I turned around I saw Peter bothered scratching his face with his dirty front foot, giving him a mud-mustache. "URGH!" he groaned and frowned angrily at me.

"Sorry!" I apologized.

"Okay, I've _had_ _it!_ We haven't even got to the filst station and I alleady have sclatches and mud all ovel me!" he exclaimed displeased. "Whose _stupid_ idea was is to let _the duck_ be in chalge of the map?"

"Well, _excuse me_, mister", Darren said indignant and turned to the panda. "I can _assure_ you that this thing is _completely_ safe in my wings."

"Uhhhh… may I have some help over here, please?" Terry suddenly asked a bit embarrassed and when I turned around I saw that he was struggling to pull out one of his hind legs that apparently had been stuck in the mud.

Pinky and I immediately waded over to give him a hand. We grabbed each one of the turtle's front feet and pulled hard. After struggling a bit, the mud finally let go of him and a light 'flop' was heard when the foot was released.

"How can you be so sule?" Peter questioned Darren. "How do we know that you'le not leading us in the wlong dilection?"

"Easy! I'm a migration bird", the wild drake explained proudly. "I can sense the Earth's magnetic field so I always know where north is."

"Oh, yeah! That is true!" Terry exclaimed suddenly remembering. "But I am sure that you have remembered to take the inclination in count."

"The what?" Darren said puzzled.

"You are aware of that the geographic and the magnetic poles are not placed at the same location? The magnetic north pole, which actually is a south pole for that matter, is located in north Canada and not by the rotation axis like the geographic one is", the turtle informed. "That results in a misleading inclination that varies depending where in the world you stand. In this area the inclination is at 69.13 degrees, with a negative declination on 3.71. That means "north" in this case actually rather is pointing towards northwest."

Darren stared stumped at the turtle. Next to me, I heard Peter gleefully let out a quiet laughter.

The duck suddenly looked down on the ground to the side and sighed. Then he sourly pressed the map against the turtle's plastron. Terry took the paper, a bit surprised.

"Alright, the truth is I've never actually had gotten the time to migrate since I've had to much schoolwork to do", Darren muttered a bit grumpy.

"Hehehe, yeah, light", Peter said quiet.

Terry took a compass out of his hat and geared the map to it.

"Don't feel down Darren. I didn't know about this incalnation-thing either", Pinky comforted and patted the duck on his wing shoulder.

I took a look at the map over the turtle's shoulder.

"Okay… We're here, right…?" I assumed, pointing at a specific location on the map.

"No, here!" Terry corrected and pointed a little to the right of my finger. "The end of this lake is right over there."

Terry did a referential nod diagonally across the reedy lake a few feet away to the right of us between the shrubberies.

"If we go this way we should manage to get to this small trail that we then can follow until we get here", the tortoise assumed, and followed with his front toe along the thin path on the map a bit ahead of us.

"Alright, let's move then!"

The road became a lot easier once we managed to get out of the swampy marsh, and after a while we finally arrived at the big meadow, which was our first stop. Far away in the middle of the green grassy area a single large oak grew. Among the branches dangled a small red-and-silver colored item, which was noticeably seen against the tree-crown's dark contrast. That must be the first box.

"Well, _this_ doesn't look suspicious _at all_", I said ironic, referring to the large open space between us and the tree.

"Whatcha think lies here?" Pinky wondered.

"Oh, that is easy to find out", Terry said confident and picked up a stone from the ground and threw it in the tree's direction.

We all followed the stone intently when it flew through the air and eventually landed hidden among the grass-blades. I expected some kind of hungry attack from firing lasers, arrows or something similar to pounce on the stone, but to everybody's great surprise absolutely _nothing_ happened.

"Okay… maybe not so easy…", Terry said broody.

"I think we need something biggel", Peter thought.

"Or… at least something more _powerfull_…", I said thoughtfully.

I took off my hat and started rummage inside it. In one of the trays I picked up a small hand grenade.

"Woah, be careful with that thing!" Pinky said and recoiled a little.

"Yeah, we don't have unlimited with ammo on us", Darren reminded.

"Uh, I don't think that's what he really… Oh, whatever! This is only a warning grenade, it's meant for these kinds of situations", I explained. "We _need_ to know what's out here."

I pulled out the sprinter and then quickly threw away the grenade over the field. It landed a little further away than Terry's stone where it quietly exploded in a small cloud of dust (it was after all only a small grenade). The ground underneath suddenly gave way under the blast and a big hole, about six feet in diameter, was revealed.

"Pitfall traps", I noted short.

"That's _all?_ Pft! Piece of cake!" Pinky said easygoing and confidently lifted his foot to walk out on the field.

"Uh… Maybe we shouldn't be _too_ easy on things here", Terry said suspicious and grabbed the chihuahua by the shoulder to stop him.

"Well, at least it doesn't seem to be any kind of aerial barrages", Darren said calmly. "Heh, lucky me!"

"Gleat! Then why don't _you_ just fly us all ovel thele?" Peter snapped.

"Hey, do I look like Superman?" Darren asked a bit annoyed. "You really think I can fly all the way over there while carrying your big butt?"

"Why you…!"

"But what you _could_ do is to go ahead and activate them for us", I pointed out tentatively. "After all, they are no threats for _you_."

"Um, I wouldn't be so…"

"Yeah, exactly!" Peter exclaimed, interrupting the turtle. "Then we finally can get some use out of youl palt on the team."

Darren glanced huffish at the panda.

"Since it's actually a very good plan, and probably the best solution we've got here, I am willing to comply with it", the mallards admitted a bit annoyed. "Alright everybody, after me! Forwaaaard, march!"

With that said, the waterfowl began marching out over the field. We gave him a slight head start before we others followed after.

We actually managed to walk several feet without anything happening. Darren carefully placed down his webbed feet on the grassy ground for each slow step he took.

"Everything seems fine here!" he called at us behind him.

We continued forward towards the tree and the box.

Suddenly, my heart skipped a beat when I felt the ground beneath my feet give way. The image of the clear blue sky disappeared from my retina, and was replaced by a dark wall of earth. Instinctively I turned around and buried my front claws into the mud wall behind me. Four long notches were carved down the wall on each side of me, right where my fingers cut, as I kept sliding downwards. I swore in my mind in pain as I felt one of my claws broke. Something suddenly grabbed a hold around my back and in the corner of my eye I saw something beige-pink wave a little. That must have been Pinky.

While I desperate continued pressing my claws into the wall, I noticed that we were slowing down and finally we stopped completely. I tried to get a reasonably good footing by forcing my hind feet into the wall as well. Once I'd managed to find a sort of rigid position to rest on, I glanced over the shoulder to see how it looked like underneath. Besides from Pinky's shocked expression in the face, I saw that we still had about two meters down to the bottom, which was almost entirely covered with thick vines with sharp thorns.

"ARE YOU ALRIGHT DOWN THERE?" I heard someone, probably Darren, calling.

I turned my head upwards and saw the dark silhouettes of three heads looking down the pit, partly blocking the sunlight.

"YES, WE'RE FINE!" I shouted back to them.

"DON'T WOLLY! WE'LE SENDING DOWN A LOPE!" Peter cried.

To the left of him, I noticed that Terry was already in the process of hauling down one end of a rope to us. We saw the thin string coming closer towards us. When it was just a couple of inches above me I carefully let go of the wall with one hand and grabbed on to it. I pulled it down a bit further and handed the end to Pinky before clutching on more properly myself.

"WE GOT IT!" I told.

"GREAT, WE WILL PULL YOU OUT NOW!" Terry called.

I felt the rope beginning to haul in so I leaned back and slowly began walking up along the wall. When we were almost there, I grasped on to the edge and pulled myself up on the grass. In the corner of my eye, I saw Peter giving Pinky a hand to help him getting out of the pit as well.

"Man! That was scary", Darren said.

"Yeah…", I uttered and dusted of the earth from my fur. I turned around and looked straight down the dark deep pit at the vines. "These traps are dangerous."

"You wele supposed to waln us about these!" Peter suddenly burst out angrily at Darren.

"Hey, it's not _my fault_ that I'm not as heavy as you are", Darren said in defense.

"No, but you could've at least had _stomped_ a little haldel", Peter said a bit snappish, "instead of just tippy-toeing that wimpy as you did."

Peter made a small imitation of Darren's tripping gait on the spot.

"Do it _yourself_ if you think it's so easy!" Darren snapped at him.

"Hey, you…"

"Ay caramba! I'VE HAD IT!" Pinky suddenly exclaimed and without warning he quickly ran right across the field towards the tree. I lost my breath for a moment when I watch the scurrying little dog suddenly falling right down into yet another trap, but before the ground around him had managed to collapse completely, he made a great leap and jumped back up on solid ground again.

He didn't stop running because of that but kept going. He stepped on two other traps, both of which he smoothly bailed out of like the first one, until he got to the big oak.

"THERE! NOW YOU'VE GOT YOUR PATH TO FOLLOW! CAN YOU, _PLEASE_, STOP FIGHTING NOW!?" he shouted towards us.

I glanced at the other three and saw that they were all staring at the chihuahua with identically amazed expressions and open jaws.

"Uuuuhhhh… yeah… we-WE'RE COMING!" Darren shouted back, still quite nonplussed.

We zigzagged our way between the open pitfalls in the ground and got to the big oak with the box hanging in a string in the tree crown. Pinky had already taken the time to climb up to it.

Getting a closer look, we saw that the box actually looked more like an angular capsule. It was about the same size as Pinky's head and seemed to consist of some kind of metal. One half was red while the other half was silver-colored. A diagonal line separated the colors on two of the long sides.

I grabbed on to one of twigs at the bottom of the tree and started climbing. The others followed my example, except Darren who flew right up, and soon we was reunited with the chihuahua. We all settled down on the branches around the capsule that Pinky already had gotten the hold on. I was sitting on a branch that grew a bit above to the left of my teammates.

"Okay, how does this thing work?" Terry, who was sitting right to the left of the puppy on the same bough, wondered.

"I'm not sure, but I think we're supposed to place our wristbands above this tape", Pinky assumed and showed the shiny black tape that stretched all across the whole silver part of the capsule's long side.

"Well, it's wolth a tly", Peter, who was standing on the branch underneath in front of them with his head right in front of the box, said and placed his light blue wrist strap across the middle of the strip. Terry and Pinky followed his example and put their straps on each side of the panda's paw.

"Um…", Darren, who was standing right to the left of Terry, uttered pensive before he gently placed one of his wings on the turtle's shoulder to maintain his balance so that he, a bit awkwardly, could stretch out his webbed foot and place his ankle over one of the strip's ends. He was the only one among us to have his strap around the ankle rather than the wrist.

Since I was sitting a bit above them, I first grabbed with my right hand around a pretty thin twig in front of me and then stretched out my left hand towards the other end of the strip.

We waited a few seconds before a light 'click' was heard from the capsule and the diagonal jack between the red and the silver part opened up a little.

"It opened!" Darren exclaimed, as if nobody had noticed that already.

"Man, you _sure_ are observant", I said ironic.

Pinky grabbed the slot and pulled in both directions. Inside the capsule's smooth roundish interior laid a scroll, which Terry took out. He rolled it up and studied it for a while. It showed a map of the route to our next station.

"So, whele ale we heading next?" Peter asked insistently.

Terry took out the compass again and geared the map to it. Darren curiously took a look at it over the turtle's shoulder.

"That way, right?" the duck assumed and pointed across the field behind us there no traps had been unveiled, yet.

"Yes, I believe that is so", Terry confirmed and nodded without lifting his head.

"Bueno! Okay, let's go!" Pinky said eagerly and let go of the box, which he had closed again, and let it dangle in the string.

"Are we going to go back the same way as we came from and then go around, or should we take the chance on crossing the field, you think?" Darren asked.

"Let me take a look", Peter asked, holding out a paw towards the turtle. "How long does it take to go alound?"

Terry handed the map to the panda, who immediately began to look through it.

"It might take a while. It is a pretty big detour", Terry presumed.

"Mah, I can just run across for you again", Pinky offered and waved unconcerned. "It was actually much easier than I had anticipated. Besides, I _am_ the fastest one among us."

"Ahrm!" Darren cleared his throat to rectify.

"_On land_ I meant", Pinky pointed out and rolled his eyes.

"I do not think that is a very good idea", Terry said, and looked suspiciously at the grass behind us. "There might be other kinds of traps in the area."

"But we _would_ save a whole lot of time if we take _that _way… Whoops!" Peter said and pointed in that direction with the paw he was holding the map in, resulting in that he dropped the paper.

The map got captured by a gust of wind that blew it away across the open area.

In the corner of my eye I suddenly noticed Pinky's ears straighten up as the fetch-instinct in him got activated.

"I'll get it! I'll get it!" the dog cried hastily and quickly rushed down from the tree. He ran over the grass with his eyes focused on the flickering object. He jumped up and caught the map in the air with his teeth.

BOOM!

A deafening sound cut through the air when the ground beneath the chihuahua suddenly exploded. The little puppy uttered a heartrending whine as he was thrown several feet above the ground and landed hard in the grass without moving.

"_PINKY!_"


	2. The Second Obstacle

**2\. The Second Obstacle**

My heart paused. It was awful seeing one of your best friends violently get thrown in the air and then helplessly hit the ground.

Without even bothering about carefully get down from the tree I jumped right down. The pain in my feet spread up my legs when I landed, but it was the last thing I had on my mind at the moment. Immediately, I ran across the meadow towards the nonmoving puppy.

Behind me, I heard the sound of rattling leaves of that my friends also got down. Darren, who of course flew all the way over, arrived first by the chihuahua's side.

"Holy ducks! Are you alright?" the bird asked worried.

The puppy moved slightly and then slowly got up in a sitting position. He turned his head towards the mallard, looking quite puzzled.

"WHAT?" Pinky asked, so loud that Darren winced.

The rest of us came up beside them.

"I ASKED IF YOU'RE ALRIGHT!" Darren screamed right into his face.

"WHAT?" Pinky screamed again.

"The bang flom the explosion must have made you deaf", Peter said while giving the chihuahua a hand to help him up on his feet.

"I CAN'T HEAR YOU! I THINK THE BANG FROM THE EXPLOSION MADE ME DEAF!" the dog shouted.

"YOU DON'T SAY!" Darren shouted sarcastic at him.

"WHAT?"

"NEVERMIND!"

"WHAT?"

"We have to hope that it is only temporary. Fortunately, he does not seem to be badly injured otherwise", Terry noted and looked at the little dog, who was picking his ear with his front-indextoe.

"No, thank goodness!" I said relieved.

"This is _outrageous!_ Are those at the agency completely out of their _minds!? _Do they want to _kill_ us before we even get a chance to graduate?" Darren said upset.

"Well, I think we all can agree on now that we are taking the long way around the meadow to the next station", Terry assumed.

"Definitely!" Peter said with no hesitation.

"D'YOU NOW WHAT I THINK? I THINK IT'D BE BETTER IF WE TAKE THE LONG WAY AROUND THE MEADOW TO THE NEXT STATION!" Pinky yelled.

"WE'VE ALREADY DECIDED… Oh, whatever!" I said, grabbing the puppy's wrist and pulling him in the settled direction.

* * *

Pinky's hearing returned, just as Terry had anticipated, after we had walked for a while.

Our next destination was the cliffs of an island in the middle of a big lake in the forest.

"I can't see it anywhere", Pinky said and squinted out over the water towards the island, which was pretty far out.

"It is possible that it may be hidden among the rocks or under the water", Terry said.

"Well, it's the right position at least", Darren noted, glanced at the map that the turtle was holding.

"It'll probably be easier to find once we get over", I adopted.

"Yeah, and apparently this seems to be my lucky day", the duck said contentedly. "Air- and waterways are my speciality."

"Yeah, we can easily swim over in no time", I said, looking down at my reflection in the calm water.

"I don't like swimming", Peter suddenly said firm.

Sigh! It is _always_ something, isn't it?

"Well, what a shame", Darren said a bit spiteful to him. "Unfortunately for you, there doesn't seem to be much of a choice here."

"Did you not heal what I said? I. Don't. Like. _Swimming!_" the stubborn panda reiterated sternly. "I am _not_ stepping my foot into that lake!"

The bear pointed firmly at the water.

"Thanks, I heard you perfectly the first time, but this isn't about what you like and not like. Do you see any charter boat around here by the way?" Darren asked annoyed. "We can't let the whole team be hold back just because _you_ aren't happy with the alternatives, you whiner!"

"Um, I _hate_ to bother you, but… I am not very comfortable with swimming either", Terry suddenly admitted a little sheepish. "I might be a turtle, but I am not a _sea _turtle."

"Thele you see! I'm not the only one", Peter snapped pompous. "Besides, I can bet my bamboo shoots on that that lake plobably is filled with electlic eels, clocodiles or some othel nasty things."

"That's not impossible", I had to admit.

"Well, how are we supposed to get to the island then?" Pinky wondered.

"Easy! We build a laft", Peter said simple. "We can use that tall dead tlee ovel thele fol matelial."

The black-and-white bear pointed at a tall bare tree nearby. The light barkless trunk stood noticing out from the other trees around it.

"Alright then, let's do some _chopping!_" said Darren alert and took off his hat to look for the string to start up the built-in chainsaw.

"Wait! Allow _me_", Peter suddenly said sure and politely bowed before us. Then he walked up to the tree, which was about the same width in diameter as the bear's belly.

He spat on the pads of his paws and then he rubbed them together. Then he started pushing the trunk, making the big tree sway. The bear continued to push on so that the tree's roots began to pop up from the ground.

"TIMBEEEEEEL!" he shouted before the whole tree fell over. The top of the leafless tree crown landed in the water with a loud splash, splitting the surface.

"Thele you go!" the panda declared and proudly held out a paw towards the felled tree.

"Wow! Nice done!" Pinky said impressed.

"Yeah, I know", Peter said cocky.

"Hmpf! Showoff!" Darren muttered.

We used our chainsaws to first cut off the roots and most parts of the crown. Then we divided the trunk into three equally big parts that we later tied together next to each other with rope. The remains of the wood from the tree top, we used to carve some oars for us.

After a few strenuous minutes we were finally able to launch our work. Pinky, Peter and I took place by the raft's stern and began pushing it down into the water while Terry and Darren pushed it by the fore to make sure it wouldn't dig down and get stuck in the wet ground by the shore. Eventually, we managed to get it completely into the water there it peacefully floated on the surface.

"Whew! Finally!" Peter puffed and wiped the sweat from his forehead.

"Now, let's just hope that it can carry the all five of us", Pinky said.

"It should, I calculated the measurements carefully", Terry reassured.

"Then I guess we have nothing to fear", Darren said.

"Yeah, and even if it won't float, for some strange reason, Darren and I can just get off and swim beside", I said.

"Exactly!" Darren agreed surefooted. "_We_ aren't scared of any lake monsters, right Perry?"

"'Course not!" I said confidently and made a high-five with my billed companion. "It's rather _they_ who should fear _us_."

"Yeah whatevel, can we get to wolk now?" Peter asked a bit annoyed.

"Yeah! C'me on, let's see what this baby can do!" Pinky said eager and ran out into the water to get aboard. The rest of us followed him.

I waited until the others had gotten aboard first before I pushed the raft a bit further out in the lake. Then I swam out to it and climbed on. Pinky and Darren helped me up.

We all settled down on our already arranged stations. Since we were all unequally heavy we tried to distribute ourselves so that the raft wouldn't tip over. Pinky and I had our seats by the fore while Darren and Peter had by the stern. Terry, on the other hand, had his seat right in the middle of the raft, holding on to a pair of binoculars. His job was to look out for possible dangers while the rest of us steered. The four of us grabbed our oars and got ready to paddle.

"Alright everybody, let's all strike together in a synchronized tempo!" I called to the others.

"Aye aye, Captain!" Darren, who was sitting right behind me on the same line, called a bit joking.

"Okay, everybody, on three! One, two, _three!_" I stroke with the paddle to move the raft forwards. "One, two, _three!_"

Behind me I heard the others joining in.

"ONE, TWO, _THREE!_ ONE, TWO, _THREE!_ ONE, TWO, _THREE…!_"

"Peter, you're supposed to paddle _at_ three. Not one-two-three and _then_ paddle", Darren pointed out.

"Well, it would have been a lot easiel if it wasn't because _someone_ has to count so fast!"

I noticed that he made a little emphasis on the word 'someone'. Was it _me_ he was referring to?

I turned my head and looked wondering at him.

I was well aware of that Peter wasn't particularly fond of me. True, he'd never actually _said_ it out loud, but he didn't have to. I got the picture. Myself, I had nothing against Peter personally (at least that's what I'm _trying_ to convince myself), though, I had to admit that I don't really share his views and opinions on things.

I do understand that all individuals are different and I respect that. I always do my best to try to stay on friendly terms with everyone, no matter how obnoxious, irritable… stubborn or… _puffed up _they might be…!

"Hey, we're all counting in the exact same tempo and, as far as I see, _you_ are the only one that has a problem with it", Darren pointed out annoyed. "Why do you _always_ have to complain about _everything?_"

"_I_ _complaining!?_ Who's the one complaining _now_ if I may ask?"

That Peter disgraced Darren wasn't a secret to anyone though.

"I wasn't _complaining_. I was just trying to come with suggestions", Darren calmly tried to persuade him.

"Could you two, _please_, stop _arguing?_" Pinky begged tired. "It won't get us anywhere."

"Oh, I've _had it!_" I said and put aside my paddle aboard on the raft. Then I took out a rope and tied one end around the middle log, right behind the other rope that tied the raft together. The other end, I tied around my belly before diving into the water. I gazed at the island in front of us and started swimming towards it. I felt the extra weight holding me back slightly while I stroke with my beaver tail in the water to move forwards. I tried to keep my head above the surface in case the other would have to shout to me.

"Say, how come _I _didn't think of that?" I heard Darren say.

A few seconds later I heard a splash and felt on the motions in the water that something dived in next to me. In the corner of my eye, I noticed that the duck had followed my example. With my eyes right by the water surface, I managed to see the total image of the struggling mallard, who was holding on to another rope end that led over his shoulder while his feet paddled underneath him, quick as drumsticks.

"Don't just sit there lounging! Keep paddling!" Darren shouted to the others.

With Darren's assistance and the extra strikes from Pinky and Peter (I presumed), I felt the weight letting up a little and I could swim faster. At this rate, we'd be over in no time.

"Uh-oh!"

Well, that didn't sound promising…

"What do you mean 'uh-oh'?" Darren asked Terry and stopped swimming. I did so too.

"Has 'uh-oh' ever meant something good?" I asked the duck sarcastic and then turned to the others.

"I see something by the shore", the tortoise told, still looking through the binoculars directed at the island.

"What?" I wondered and climbed back up on the raft again.

"Let me see", Peter asked.

Terry took off the strap around his neck and handed over the binoculars to the bear.

The panda squinted through the double-lenses and searched along the beach for a while.

"Clocodiles, I told you so", he eventually said a bit sighing.

"To be more accurate, I think they are alligators", Terry corrected.

"Whatevel!" Peter said nonchalant.

"Alright, that settles it! The agency really _does_ want to kill us", Darren, who'd also gotten up on the raft, sighed hopelessly.

"May I have a look too?" I asked curious.

The panda lowered the binoculars and handed them to me. I placed the double-lenses in front of my eyes and directed it towards the island. Through the round image inside them I first got a close-up of a bunch of trees. I searched around until I finally found the shore. There by the water, I noticed a lot of gnarls sticking up above the surface as the gigantic reptiles slowly swam by.

"How many are they?" Pinky asked.

I tried to distingue which gnarls belonged to the same gator and counted the predators.

"I see five of them", I announced and lowered the binoculars.

"I got them to eight when I counted", Terry told, and then gently took back the binoculars to take another look.

"Do you think they have spotted us yet?" Darren wondered.

"I do not think so", Terry said. "They are too far away."

"If they had seen us they would have been on theil way ovel hele alleady, light?" Peter thought.

"Mm, unless… they are _expecting_ us", Terry said pensively.

"What makes you think that?" Pinky asked.

Terry lowered the binoculars and turned to us.

"Well, you see, usually it is only smaller alligators that live together in group while the larger ones live by themselves. None of these guys are particular small and it is not mating season."

"You mean there's no reason for them to gather like this?" I guessed as I thought I began to understand where he was going with this.

"Unless they know that there is _food_ coming", the turtle said. "The agency has probably used exactly the same alligators during earlier tests so they have most likely learned by now that there is no reason for them to swim around and hunt since they already know precisely where the food will arrive. As you might see, the island has a lot of cliffs surrounding most of the shore and the only safe place to get aland is by that beach."

"You mean they ale _tlained?_" Peter asked.

"Well, maybe not like we are, but enough to notice repeating patterns."

"So, how do we get past them?" I asked brooding.

"Are you sure we can't board the island by the cliffs?" Darren wondered.

Terry took out the map again and studied it for a moment.

"No, only _you_ would be able to do that because of your flying ability", the turtle informed. "I can not find any other safe spots."

"Hmm…", Pinky pondered, pensively resting his head in his front-paw.

"Hey! Guys!" he suddenly exclaimed. "I think I have an idea!"

* * *

Through the murky green water, close to the sandy seabed, I watched the cliffs of the island unveil before me. I threw regularly looks over both of my shoulders to keep an eye out for the alligators. I'd already equipped myself with a long thick stick that I had taken from the lake floor, and a coiled rope over my shoulder. I'd also made sure that I easily could bring out my gun in case I would get in really big trouble.

Once I got to the cliff, I swam to the right with my body close to the rock wall. I slowed down a little when I noticed that the wall began to curve inwards. When I caught sight of one of the big reptiles swimming right by the surface, I stopped. It was still about thirty feet to it, but I decided it was better to be safe than sorry.

I cautiously swam up along the wall to the surface. There I got a better view over the beach and, more important, the alligators.

I began tinkering with my wristcommunicator and called Terry.

"I am in position now", I quietly announced to the turtle, whose face appeared on the small round screen.

"Great! Now we just need to await the decoy duck", he said.

"I'll report back as soon as I see him", I promised.

"Roger! Over and out!"

I hung up and then lowered my head down below the surface again. It was much easier to keep an eye for the alligators there.

After a few minutes, I suddenly saw the lower side of a dark and oblong object that floated by the surface in towards the island. It was heading towards the rocks to the right of the shore, away from me.

Finally, I tought and swam up to the surface again to report.

Pinky's plan had been to separate one of the logs from the raft and then letting Darren paddle towards the island alone, in order to lead the alligators away from the beach. Then, the rest of us could sneak aland behind them. My role in the whole plan was to swim ahead to keep track of the gators and make sure that the whole operation went as planned, and alert in case something would go wrong.

"C'ME ON HERE YOU UGLY OVERGROWN HANDBAGS!" Darren called to the great reptiles that immediately set off towards him as planned. "ANYONE UP FOR SOME DUCK FOR LUNCH?"

He held an oar high above his head, ready to slap the gators. Besides the oar, Darren also had a water bomb (a bomb that activates when it comes in contact with water) close to hand in case the alligators would become too intrusive. Hopefully, he wouldn't have to use it at all. The plan was, after all, for him to _attract_ them, not scare them away.

After I'd report to the others, I dived beneath the surface again to count and make sure that all gators took the bait.

… six… seven… eight… and nine. (We found one more when we made a more careful check earlier). Well, that was all, now the beach was free. I looked up towards the surface and saw the underside of the other two logs. The three oars repeatedly cut the surface as the raft moved in towards the island.

Suddenly I noticed that two of the alligators seperated from the pack and headed straight toward the larger raft.

Oh no you don't! Not in _my_ water!

Without really thinking very much I swam out from the wall and waved wildly with my hands against them. They saw me and directly swam in my direction. While the two reptiles hurried along, almost motionless, towards me, I quickly took out the rope, which I had already taken the time to tie into a snare by one end, and held up the loop in front of me.

One of the alligators was swimming slightly faster than the other and therefore that one arrived first. I quickly dodged to the side, avoiding the rapidly closing jaws and let the reptile's long U-shaped snout fall right into the snare, which I then immediately pulled hard so the jaws closed. Above me, I suddenly watched right down the throat of the second alligator, ready to close his jaws around me, but for him I had another surprise. I directly pressed in the stick vertically so that it got stuck between the gator's palate and tongue. Then I quickly swam close up behind him and climbed up on his thick-skinned neck and put my hands before his eyes. He immediately began to flounder about and bucking his head to lose the stick. While holding on tight to him, I threw a quick glance down at the other wriggling reptile to make sure that the knot around the snout didn't lose up.

I knew that the muscles that merges the jaws of alligators and crocodiles are very powerful, but that the muscles to _open_ them, however, were ridiculously weak. It was enough to only use something as simple as a rubber band or tape to keep them shut.

After a while, I saw the stick slowly sinking to the bottom when it finally came off. I was quick to immediately put one hand under the reptile's chin and the other one on top of his nose to force the jaws together with a smack. Then I took the other end of the rope and tied him up too.

I left the two alligators to helplessly struggle trying to break free and swam up to the surface to search for my friends. Pinky, Terry and Peter had already managed to make their way to the beach and were wading in the last part since the raft apparently had run aground. Against the blue sky, I saw Darren flying around. Apparently, the alligators had become a little too much for him in the end. Well, it didn't matter anyhow at this point, we were all safe now.

Apparently, I thought that thought way too soon, because there were actually still_ one_ person that wasn't out of danger yet. Me.

I had completely forgotten about being careful when I wrestled the two alligators and suddenly I noticed that the other seven remaining killer reptiles were all going straight towards me.

Uh-oh!

I didn't have enough bullets in my gun to take them all out so there was only one thing left for me to do. SWIM FOR MY LIFE!

Quickly, I turned around and went off like a torpedo. I throw an eye over my shoulder and watched the big reptiles slip after more and more. That they were slower than I didn't surprise me, but it wasn't enough for me to feel at ease. My biggest problem at the moment wasn't that they would catch up to me. It was that I didn't have anywhere else to go. I couldn't swim around them on the outer side since they were too spread out, and the rocks were just too difficult to climb. There was nothing for me to do!

Suddenly, I heard an explosion behind me whose sound got dampened a bit because of the water and whose diffusing force gave me a short ride forwards on the flow. I turned around and among multi of bubbles streaming up to the surface I saw the alligators flee away in terror.

"I needed a good place for that water bomb anyway", Darren, who I suddenly noticed was hovering over me, said. "It was just taking up space in my luggage."

"Well, thank you very much!" I said grateful.

"D'you want a lift up to the island?"

"Are you sure you can carry me all the way up?" I asked a bit dubious, and looked up towards the cliffs.

"It's only a short distance, I think I can handle it. Grab on!"

I grabbed the wild drake's thin legs and watched from below how he wildly started flapping his wings faster to pull me out. I saw the rock wall disappear down before my eyes like a fast downwards going escalator before I finally felt solid ground under my webbed feet again.

"Whew! I made it! I _actually made it!_" Darren exclaimed, slightly panting. Apparently, he was pretty surprised by his own effort.

"Yeahyeah, well done", I said nonchalant and shook off most of the water from my soaked coat.

"Hey, you! Say it, don't spray it!" he said annoyed, but not to irritated, and winced and blinked when the drops hit him in the eye.

"Oh, and I who brought some extras just for you", I joked and sprawled my wet fingers close to his face so that even more drops fell on him. "No, let's go and meet up with the others now."

We went back to the beach where the others waited. Pinky immediately rushed up to meet us.

"Where did you go? I thought we were supposed to meet up right at the beach", the pup said.

"Did we not agree on that you should swim ashore _right_ _after_ the alligators had been lead away?" Terry asked and sounded pretty serious. He and Peter joined us right behind Pinky.

"Yes, I know, but I had to take care of two of them that separated from the pack", I told.

"Wait! _You_ fought two of those beasts all by _yourself?_" Pinky asked and seemed quite impressed.

"Well… yeah", I said a bit modest.

"Man, that's just _so cool!_" the chihuahua exclaimed.

"He _always_ has to be a helo", I thought I heard Peter murmur.

"I beg your pardon?" I said to him.

"Well, we are all here now anyway", Terry, who didn't seem to have heard the panda's harsh words, said a bit sighing. "Let us try to find that capsule now, shall we?"

The turtle took out the folded map from his hat again and began unfolding it.

"_Ahrm!_ I can inform you that that part is already solved", Darren suddenly pointed out proud. "When I was leading the alligators away I couldn't avoid noticing something shiny dangling by the cliffs over there."

Darren pointed with a brown wingfeather off towards the right side of the beach where the alligators had swum earlier.

"Oh, well, that's great!" Pinky said. "Let's go then!"

The second capsule looked exactly like the first one. It hung in a long string a few feet down below the edge of the cliff. It repeatedly hammered against the rock wall with a constant deafening high pitched clang. Darren flew down and picked it up. We opened it the same way as we did with the first one and took out the map that would lead us to the next station.

"Alright guys! Two down, three to go!" Pinky exclaimed happily and made high five with everyone of us. "What an incredible team we are!"

"Yeah… sure… incredible…", I uttered a little hesitant, and couldn't help but glancing at Peter.

"Alright then, let's move on to the next location", Darren, who'd taken a look at the map over Terry's shoulder.

"Yes, there is no reason for us to stay here any longer", Terry stated and folded the new map. "We have to get back to the mainland."

"Aha, okay… Wait! WHAT!?"

He did not say just that? _Seriously!? _Oh great!


	3. The Third Obstacle

**3\. The Third Obstacle**

"Well, hi guys!"

The familiar voice came from between the trees to the left of the trail we walked on and when I turned around, I saw Kitty the Cat coming our way. Right behind her was Danny the Dog, Owen the Owl, Tucker the Turkey and Sergei the Snail, who was tacked on to a stick that Tucker was holding.

"Hi!" I greeted back happy.

"How are you doing so far?" the feline asked.

"You mean with the exception of that we only just recently almost got eaten by hungry alligators? Well, pretty swell I guess", Darren said a bit sarcastic.

The way back to the mainland had gone relatively easy. Darren and I had swum as fast as we could and the gators didn't even notice us until we were almost there. They didn't even get a chance to catch up on us before we were all aland.

"You got alligators huh?" Sergei said interested.

"Well, we got piranhas", Danny informed.

Oh, right! All groups have been designated to different stations, I suddenly remembered. I wonder what kind of challengers the other teams have gotten…

"Yeah, I tell you, I'm _so _going to report this test to the management!" Darren said upset. "These tasks are _way _too dangerous! This is _not _the way you treat the agents of the future!"

"Aww, was poor little Darren scared?" Kitty teased a little.

"I wasn't _scared_, I just don't have a wish to _die_, that's all", he said.

"So, how many tasks have _ya_ gott'n through so fah?" Tucker asked curious.

"We just finished our second one", Terry informed.

"_That's all?_ Ha! What a bunch of slowpokes you are", Kitty teased a bit laughing.

"Um, the test is not a race", the turtle pointed out a bit wondering. "All groups have been assigned different stations on different locations. It would have just been unfair."

"How many have _you_ finished by the way?" I asked them.

"Our third base is just a few meters away in that direction", Owen, who was holding their map, told and pointed through the dense thicket to the right of the path.

"But… that means that you've gotten about as far as we have", Pinky realized a little puzzled.

"And you'le calling _us_ slowpokes. What's up with that?" Peter asked.

"I was just intimidating you", Kitty said easygoing.

"Oh, I see! You don't believe you'll be finished before us", I said taunting.

"Ha! You gotta be kidding me, right?" the cat said incredulously. "There's _no chance_ that you'll get to the finish line first."

"Oh yeah? How about we settle things up?" I suggested thrilled.

"Ooo, a challenge? I like the sound of that. Okay, it's a deal!" Kitty said psyched up and held out a yellow paw toward me to shake hands on it.

"May the best team win", I said and shook the paw.

"Well, it won't be hard to tell which _that's_ gonna be", Pinky said confidently.

"_Exactly!_ I couldn't agree more", Owen said sure.

"Uh, is this really necessary?" Terry questioned weary. "It is not even a real contest…"

"Alright, guys! Let's give it all we've got!" Danny said all fired up, interrupting the turtle.

"YEAH!"

"Then let's move!" Owen said eager.

"Good luck boys!" Kitty said to us. "You're gonna need it."

"Thanks, but we don't need any _luck _to win", I said bold. "We all got enough _mad skills_ to make up for that."

"I will let the outcome speak for that", the cat said. "Well, see you one the other side of the finish line!"

The five other animal agents moved on through the woods.

"Only _after_ you've eaten _our dust!_" I called after them.

* * *

The next stop was by the foot of a high mountain. A thick fog swept around us the closer we got and it was hard to even discern the outline of the mountain. If it hadn't been for the spreading irregular circle-shaped contour lines around a certain spot on the map, we probably would have missed that it even was there.

"Alright gang, this is the place. The capsule should be here somewhere", Darren, who'd managed to persuade Terry to re-take the charge of the map, stated and stopped walking. He looked up at the tall dusky triangular silhouette that arose before us through the white mist.

"Well, I don't see anything", Peter pointed out a bit sourly, "but I guess I shouldn't be too sulplised."

"Hey! This time I am sure", the duck said, "and I can prove it to you."

Darren walked over to Peter and showed him the map.

"See, we're right here, right by this curve a few feet from that big boulder that we just passed by…"

Terry leaned his head slightly towards me.

"Say, how come Peter is always so hostile against Darren?" he asked whispering, frowning wonderingly.

"Don't ask me!" I said short and pretended to look around for the capsule in the fog. Seriously Terry,_ don't ask!_

"Well, we have to search around in the area for it. Look behind big rocks, among the bushes, in the trees. The capsule _is_ here somewhere", Darren said decisively and we all spread out and began searching, carefully so that we wouldn't lose each other in the fog.

I pulled away a couple of leafy branches of a shrub to take a look when suddenly a sparrow flew out from it straight into my face while uttering a high squeal, making me jerk. It continued to fly away to the sky and disappeared into the fog. I kept searching inside the shrub.

"Hey! Amigos! I've found it!" I suddenly heard Pinky call a few feet away. "Or… well, I've found _something_…"

I rushed directly to where the voice had come from. My other teammates had already managed to find him before me and, with their noses in the air, they were all staring at something above their heads.

"That one doesn't look like any of the others", Darren pointed out.

I turned my head up to see what they were all looking at. In the long slender tree in front of us, I saw a dark-gray cubical shaped metal box, which seemed to be about the same height as me. One of its corners were attached to one end of a rope, whose other end was attached almost right by the top of the narrow tree, which due to the box's weight was bent.

"Do you think it could be some kind of clue?" Pinky wondered.

"Well, it's not a _fruit_, that's for sure", Darren said ironic. "I fly up and check it out."

The water fowl flapped with his wings, making the leaves on the ground whirl around, and flew up to the box. Once there, he tried to land with his webbed feet on one of the flat sloping sides, which apparently turned out to be not so easy. The duck flapped like crazy while trying to find a relatively stable place on the slippery surface, and then by the edges. The bent tree top lowered and rose due to the extra weight repeatedly being put on and off, making the box swing. Eventually, Darren gave up and flew back down to us.

"It's completely sealed", he told just before he landed. His wingbeats gave us all a small whiff. "I couldn't find anywhere on it on how to get it open. And that wire is made of some kind of metal. Does anybody have a really strong pincher or something?"

"I have", Terry told.

"Great! Then I'm just going to put on my special shoes so I can stand on that thing while clipping the wire…"

"_Or_, we could just saw down the tree", Pinky suggested.

Darren looked a bit dumfounded him.

"Well… that could work too…"

"It is a _living_ tree", Terry pointed out serious. "It is illegal to cut down trees that are still alive."

"Well… yeah, but even agents s'got to make some exceptions sometimes", Pinky opined.

"Whoa, wait! Before we do anything drastic here, let's try imagining the whole picture", I asked them all to. "Exactly _what_ will happen if we chop down the tree?"

"Um, it _falls?_" Peter said and looked at me as if I was a complete moron.

"Exactly! And the box would probably get smashed", I pointed out.

"Yeah, isn't that what we want? To get it opened?" Peter asked and seemed somewhat annoyed.

"We have no idea of what's inside that thing", I remarked serious. "Who knows, it might be a bomb."

"A bomb?" Peter questioned skeptic.

"Well, considering everything else we've gotten through so far I wouldn't be surprised", I said.

"He's got a point there", Darren admitted.

Pinky looked up at the box and recoiled a little, as if he expected it to detonate at any time.

"D'you think _this_ could what our next obstacle is all about?" the chihuahua wondered out loud. "Opening a well-sealed box?"

"It is not impossible", Terry said. "The question is, how do we get it down in one piece?"

"Oh, let _me_ take cale that", Peter said sure. "You lemebel that it sunk a little when Dallen tlied to land on it ealliel? If I climb up the tlunk, I can make the tlee bend and the box will eventually leach the glound and then you can just snip off the stling."

"Yeah… and then _after_ we've cut the string the tree will hurl you away like a catapult. I like that idea!" Darren said in a way that was hard to tell whether he was being sarcastic or not. Or maybe both.

"I will _not_ get _hull_ away", Peter said determined. "When it comes to handling poles _I_'m the best. I can hold on without flying off."

"Well, it _is_ actually a very good plan to safely get down the box", Terry said quite impressed and even though I hated to admit it, I actually agreed.

"I know. After all, _I_'m the one who suggested it. Okay, hele I go!" the panda said eager and grabbed on around the trunk, which was just a little bit wider than him, and started climbing.

"If only _I_ could climb like that", I heard Pinky say impressed while we all observed how the black-and-white bear grabbed on with his furry hind legs around the bark to be able to then move his front paws higher and pull himself upwards, then repeating the process over and over again. Well, I guess bears _are_ good climbers.

The tree leaned over more and more the higher he got. Well, that is, until he got to the curve's highest point, then he technically was climbing _downwards_. We watched the gray metal box coming closer down to us and we managed to get a more carefully look at it. All the square sides were welded so opening it with a crowbar was not even to talk about. Even the screws that were placed along the edges, giving each side a square dotted frame, had been welded.

"Just a little bit more!" Terry cried to the panda that upside-down held on to the underside of the leaning trunk, which was a lot narrower at higher level. The bear kept cautiously pulling himself forward a few more inches 'til the box eventually reached the ground completely.

"Is that enough?" he shouted at us and I heard on his muffled voice that he was struggling to hold on.

"Yes, that's fine!" I announced loud and heaved myself up on the box's upper side to cut the string. The box was only a little bit taller than I.

Terry handed me the pincher and I placed the open sharp nippers around the thick steel wire without pulling them together yet.

"We're ready here, are you holding on tight?" I asked and looked up at the panda between the tree crown's leafy narrow branches.

"_Just do it will you!_" he cried irritated.

"Alright! Here goes!" I shouted and pulled the nippers together. I had to exaggerate a little before I managed to completely snip the gray wire. I saw the upper part of the string above the pincher disappear in a flash before my eyes and a 'schwung' was heard when the tree crown flung.

"WAAAAAH…!" I heard Peter shout as the tree trunk straightened out. We all followed him intently with our eyes and crossed our fingers that he wouldn't hurl away. Amazingly, he didn't.

The tree continued to rapidly wiggle for a while so all that was seen of the bear was some blurry black-and-white curved lines. The wiggling slowed down until it finally stopped completely. Peter still held on tight to the trunk before he slowly began climbing down.

Was it just me, or did the panda's movements seem to just be a little bit shaky…?

Apparently it wasn't just me because suddenly we all watched the bear limply beginning to lean backwards and loose the grip around the tree trunk.

"Uh-oh, I think he is fainting!" Terry said worried.

"Oh, no!" Pinky exclaimed appalled.

"Quick! Out with the damp-field!" Terry ordered and immediately took out two small things that kind of reminded a little of boomerang-bentlike double-pointing laser pointers.

I immediately threw the pincher aside and jumped down from the box. On the fly, I also took out two identical pointers and directed one of them against Terry, who held out one of his in my direction, and my other one towards Pinky's. Pinky and Terry directed both their second pointer towards Darren, who was standing opposite to me a few feet away, also directing his pointers towards them. An electric beam was sent out from all the pointers through the air and connected them to each other into a large circle. My eyes got dazzled by the light from the flash beam that linked my own two pointers to each other in their other ends, right in front of my chest. A transparent magenta force field appeared in the middle of the circle and spread out along the electric edges.

This was a kind of electric safety net that O.W.C.A. had created specifically to mitigate the decline of free-falling objects.

We quickly located exactly where the panda would land and immediately rushed over there. Helplessly, we watched the panda hit some of the tree branches on the way down. He landed just a smidgeon above the middle of the field, closest to Pinky, where he bounced a few times. When he had stopped bouncing, we gently placed him down on the ground and turned off the force field.

"Peter, are you alright?" Pinky asked anxiously and took his paw. "_Please_, say something!"

The panda's head turned a little to the side towards Pinky. That's when I noticed the big swelling in his forehead that stretched out the skin so that the blue-and-reddened skin beneath the white coat was visible. He must have hit his head in the trunk when the tree was thrown back and forth.

"Urgh…", he suddenly uttered low and slowly opened his eyelids and looked up at Pinky with his tiny eyes.

"Pinky… Lemind me to _nevel_ do that again."

Pinky let out a sigh in relief and so did the rest of us.

"Here! Take this!" Terry said and held out a plastic bag filled with ice.

Terry placed the bag on the swollen area of Peter's head. The panda grimaced in pain a little, but still took the bag and rested it on his forehead. Then he slowly stood up on his hind legs.

"Go and rest for a while", Darren recommended. "We'll take care of the box."

Pinky helped Peter to gently get to the nearest tree to sit down and lean his back against the tree trunk.

"Oooo!" he wailed a little when the pain flared up.

"You should have worn a helmet", I said to him.

He glanced annoyed up at me, still with the ice bag against the swelling.

"Well, thank fol telling me that _now!_" he snapped at me.

Jeez!

"C'me on! Let's check out the box", Darren suggested, and the four of us went over to it.

Terry, who arrived first, took a closer look to inspect the welded edges.

"It is completely sealed as you said", he stated. "A crowbar will not be enough."

"How 'bout a chainsaw?" Pinky suggested.

"I do not think that would work either", the turtle said thoughtful and knocked a little on one of the sides. "The metal is too hard. I think we have to use the lasers to open it."

"Okay, let's try that", I said determined.

We all started tinkering with our wristwatches with the built-in laser in it.

"We take one side each, so we can open it quicker", Pinky suggested and walked around to the side opposite to Terry.

"That sounds good", Terry said and nodded.

Darren and I took positions by the two remaining sides and we all started working on the metal shell by the corners, just below the thin bulging welding lines.

A weak, yet quite annoying, 'bzzz' was heard when the four thin red beams burrowed into the metal. Terry had been right when he assumed that the metal was hard 'cause it took a while before the beams managed to penetrate completely. Slowly, I brought the laser further to the right while I, almost hypnotized, followed the small point with my eyes where the beam cut. It was actually very unexciting.

"Well… this is boring", I said.

"Yeah… Anybody know a good song?" Darren asked.

"Oh, oh! How about the O.W.C.A. song? You know: _O.W.C.A_….", Pinky suggested enthusiastic and suddenly began singing the chorus.

_"… it's fun to work at the…",_ Darren sang.

_"… O.W.C.A.",_ they both sang loud.

_"Whether you gallop around…",_ I sang.

_"… or crawl on the ground…",_ Terry sang.

_"… it's time that we party down",_ the all four of us sang together and made a crescendo. _"It's fun to work at the_

_O.W.C.A._

_It's fun to work at the_

_O.W.C.A."_

I couldn't help but to start dancing a little on the spot. I just had to make sure that I kept holding the pointer straight.

_"When fighting evil is done_

_and you've finally won_

_it's time to kick back and have some fu…"_

"DO YOU _HAVE TO_ SING LIGHT _NOW!?_" Peter suddenly burst out, highly irritated. "I ALLEADY HAVE A HEADACHE!"

"Oh! Sorry Peter! We'll be quiet", Pinky promised.

Great! _Right_ when we're starting to have fun here!

After a while, we finally managed to cut off the upper part so we could open and see what's inside the large container. Peter had by this time managed to recover slightly and waited, just like the rest of us, strained to see what kind of mysteries was being unveiled before us.

I carefully took a grip of the loose upper part, which still was pretty warm due to the lasers, and slid it aside a bit. Ten eyes immediately got thrown down over the somewhat jagged metal edge into the box.

"I don't see any bomb", Peter said quite disappointed while we all stared at the well-known red-and-silver colored capsule, which was the only thing inside. Its shimmering silver metal made the gray metal of the larger box look pretty dirty in comparison.

"Well, it was better to be safe than sorry", Terry said and shrugged.

I pulled away the top-side and let it lean against one of the box-sides on the ground. Then I heaved myself up over the edge to get inside and get the capsule. It wasn't until I'd picked it up that I felt there was something different about it. I turned it around in my paws and a few inches below the black strip I noticed a small keyboard with a thin digital display on it.

"How's it going?" Darren suddenly asked.

"Look at this!" I called and showed my teammates the keyboard. Everyone looked in wonder at it.

"Let me see", Terry asked and held out his orange forefeet towards me. I handed it to him and leaned over the edge without getting out of the box.

"What do you think this means?" I wondered after the others had managed to get a closer look at it.

"Obviously problem", Darren said sarcastic.

"I assume we are supposed to type some kind of password", Terry adopted and kept inspecting the keyboard. "A password with letters."

"So… whatcha think the password is?" Pinky wondered.

"I honestly have no idea", Terry said pondering.

"This is a strange task", Darren said quite frustrated. "I'm almost starting to miss the alligators. _Almost_. At least we knew what to do that time. _This_ on the other hand is just… mean."

"Well, all challenges do not need to be life risking to be difficult", Terry noted. "They can simply just be… well, tricky."

"Is there any chance that we can hack the password?" Pinky asked tentative.

"I am already trying to see if we can detach the board to get to the wires", Terry, who was trying to peep into the small gap between the keyboard and the capsule, told, "though, it does not look like it is possible. We _need_ the password."

"Maybe thele'le some kind of clues in the alea to what the passwold is", Peter suggested.

"Well, that would not be illogical", Terry admitted.

"Well, there _sure_ are a lot of options around here for us to choose between", Darren said sarcastic. "What do you think the right word could be? Rock? Tree? Stick? Leaf?"

"Potato?" I said.

"Potato", Darren repeated without thinking. "_Potato?_"

"Where do you see that?" Pinky asked puzzled.

"In here", I told.

At the bottom part of the box by one of the corners, I had noticed something that looked like a scripture engraved in the metal. I bent down and squinted to try to discern the text. I blew away the dust that filled the neatly carved grooves. "There's something written here."

Shadows descended over me when my friends leaned over the edge to take a look, which made it harder for me to read the text.

"What? What's it saying?" Pinky asked excited.

I took out a flashlight and a magnifying glass and began to read aloud:

"'To open the capsule, one must write potato backwards.'"

"Well, _that_ went a lot easier than I thought it would be", Darren said content.

"Why potato?" Peter wondered puzzled.

"Jee I dunno, maybe some kind of intern joke among the test constructers", Darren guessed wildly. "Alright, so, hm… potato backwards becomes…"

"Otatop", Terry answered before any of us even got the time to figure it out by ourselves.

"Yeahyeah, no need to show off. Just write it down, will you?" Darren asked the turtle a bit nonchalant.

Terry typed the code on the little keyboard and pressed enter.

_"BZZZ!"_ it ominously sounded from the machine and a digital red text appeared on the small screen.

"'Access denied'?" Terry read, highly surprised.

"WHAT!?" exclaimed Pinky bewildered.

"Maybe you spelled it wlong", Peter suggested.

"_Terry?_ Spelling _WRONG!?_" Pinky said, even _more_ bewildered.

"I can call up the letters slowly, if you'd like?" I offered.

"Yeah… Sure, go ahead", the reptile uttered, still very confound.

I leaned down over the small text again and loudly called up the first… er… _last_ letter in the word and waited until I heard Terry affirmative answer with an echo before I continued with the next one.

"O-T-A-T-O-P. _Otatop!_" Terry spelled out aloud before carefully pressing enter again.

"_BZZZ!_"

"It didn't _work?_" Darren said baffled.

"URGH! You stupid piece of junk!" Peter suddenly burst out and took away the capsule from the turtle.

"WE WLOTE THE LIGHT WOLD! SO _WHY_ WON'T YOU _OPEN!?_" the fierce panda screamed at it and began shaking it furiously.

"I don't understand", Pinky said quite discouraged. "We've done _everything_ right!"

"We must have forgotten something", I adopted and immediately started to look around at other places inside the box. I directed the flashlight to the other three corners to see if there was something written there too, but I didn't find anything at all. Wait! The top piece!

I jumped out of the box and began inspecting the detached upper part. There was nothing there either.

"This is stupid! Who's the idiot that constructed this task?" Darren asked outraged. "It says clearly that we're supposed to write potato backwards so _why _won't it work!?"

Terry suddenly lifted his head up in flash. In the reptile's orange face, I saw his eyes widen up more and more.

"OH! _Now_ I get it!" he suddenly exclaimed loud and lightly smacked his forehead with his front foot a little. "We are not supposed to write _potato_ backwards, we are supposed to write potato backwards!"

"Uuuuhhh… Say what?" Peter asked confused.

"Give me that!" the tortoise said and eagerly took back the capsule from the panda. "Do not worry, I know _exactly_ what I am doing. I hope."

He immediately began pressing the keyboard.

"P-O-T-A-T-O space B-A-C-K-W-A-R-D-S. _Potato backwards!_" he said aloud and pressed enter.

"_Drrring!_" the capsule said happy and a green text on the screen showed 'ACCESS'.

"YES! It worked!" Pinky jubilated loud.

"Yeah, not a second too soon", said Darren liberating.

The all five of us gathered around the canister and put our bands over the black strip. After hearing the wonderful familiar click, we could finally open it.

Considering the previous statistics, we obviously had expected to see a rolled paper lying inside it, so imagine everyone's faces when our eyes were met by something completely different.

"_What_ is _that?_"

* * *

_**Remember to check out my music video of the song "The Agents of O.W.C.A." (made by ErisPerap) on YouTube.**_


	4. The Fourth Obstacle - part 1

**4\. The Forth Obstacle – part 1**

"_What_ is _that?_" Pinky asked while we all bewilderedly watched the odd sand-coloured buckled cone-shaped lump of hard clay lying inside the capsule.

"I have _no idea_", I said ponderingly and gently picked up the clump to take a look at it. I twisted and turned it in my paw, studying the long tiny dents on its surface. Its shape _did_ look kind of familiar though…

"It looks like a spettekaka", Terry said.

"A sped-what?" Pinky asked confounded.

"A _spettekaka_. It is a kind of Swedish delicacy, mostly made out of sugar and flour", the turtle explained.

"Well, I _was_ going fol something sweet", Peter said and suddenly grabbed the lump from me.

"NO…!" I cried and reached out my hand for it, but too late, the panda had already taken a bite of the top of it. He chewed for a while, then his face crumpled into a nauseate grimace before he suddenly spat out the chewed pieces on the ground.

"_YUCK!_ Swedish desselts ale not a big hit", he said.

"YOU _IDIOT!_" I shouted angrily and hastily took back the clay lump. "URGH! I'D _JUST_ FIGURED OUT WHAT THIS IS, AND YOU TAKE A _BITE_ OF IT! HOW MORE _STUPID_ CAN YOU GET!?"

Seriously, how can _anyone_ be _that _stupid!?

"Don't call me stupid!" Peter said exasperated. "_He_ was the one who said it was candy."

Peter pointed accusingly at Terry.

"Huh? Um, I just said it _looked like_ it, not that it _was_ it", the turtle corrected, a bit shocked. "Besides, I am not sure if spettekaka is classified as candy. I think it is more of a bake work rather…"

"Ugh! Yeah, anyway, what was it that you'd figure out, Perry?" Pinky asked a bit sighing.

I breathed out slowly to try to come to my senses before I started explaining.

"Okay, look, this _is_ a map", I began, holding up the half-eaten clump. "It's a 3D-model of the mountain behind us! That's our next station!"

"OHHHH!" everybody said, suddenly realizing.

"Yeah! Now I see it!" Darren said and viewed the model fascinated. "All these tiny jack are roads that shows how to get up."

"Yeah, I'd _just_ manage to get a glimpse of a tiny red cross by the top, that will say, until _someone_ ate it", I said, staring firmly at the panda.

Peter sighed bothered and rolled his eyes.

"Allight, I'm _solly!_" he said a bit snappish.

"Okay, I guess we should try to find this spot and then go up", Terry said thoughtfully and pointed at a place at the bottom of the model where the road began. "We have to navigate by ourselves the last part."

"I can fly in advance to overview the area when we get there", Darren offered.

"Okay, great! Then let's go!" Pinky said joyful. "To the top!"

While we walked through the woods towards the mountain, I heard Darren chuckle a little to himself behind me.

"Hehehehehe…"

"What's so funny?" Peter asked next to him.

I turned my head and saw the wild drake grin amused at the bear.

"Hehehe… Seriously, Peter? _Seriously?_ You _actually_ thought that thing was _candy!?_ Ahahaha…"

"Urgh! Ah, cut it off!" the panda said provoked and pushed the duck.

* * *

"Hey! I just realized one thing! All these tasks represent the four elements!" Pinky suddenly said while we followed the rocky path up the mountain. He was walking right behind Terry, who was walking behind me. I had taken the lead since I was the one who'd offer to take care of the model. Just to be sure that a certain _someone_ wouldn't have a chance to destroy it even more.

"_How_ do you get it to that?" Darren asked Pinky skeptic. He was walking last in the line (right behind Mr. _Someone_) so that he could overview everybody in case any of us would fall.

"Well, think about it! The first task, the minefield, represents earth. The second one, the alligator lake, is water. And _this_ one represents air."

"What about the third one?" I questioned.

"Well, since there only are four elements and the test has five stations I guess one has to be left out", Pinky adopted.

"Actually, according to some philosophers, the fifth element is ether, the thing that surrounds the Earth", Terry informed.

"_Exactly!_ And that fits _perfectly_ in with the strange box", Pinky cried elated.

"Well, if that's the case I guess we already now can figure out what the _last_ obstacle is going to be about", Darren said.

Before me, I could already imagine the blinding light from the tall flickering flames surrounding us all inside an incredibly hot circle.

"Uh-oh... well, _that_ does not sound very promising", Terry said and laughed a little uneasily.

"I think you'le just thinking too much", Peter said sceptic. "Thele is plobably no lelation between the elements and the obstacles. At least not inteldentally."

"Well, who knows?" Darren said and shrugged.

I looked out over the misty forest where the tree tops were sticking up out of the fog. We had already gotten pretty far up. Though, I already knew things were going to get tougher ahead…

"Halt!" I called to the others behind me. Then I took out the spettekaka to compare it with our current position. (I couldn't help but quietly sigh every time I saw the bite marks that lined the hollow model.)

"Have we come to the bitten part already?" Darren asked.

"No, but this road is going to end a bit further ahead", I told. "Look here."

I held up the model in front of them and pointed at a place where the path melted into the clay.

"To continue on, we have to get to this point here", I told, pointing at a path on the model that was going parallel above the one we were on.

We all turned our heads up and peered through the thick fog to try to get a glimpse of the other road. It was very difficult to see, not only because of the mist, but also because it didn't really stand out when you looked from seven meters below. It looked more like just a small bulge in the rock. If we hadn't had the model we'd probably never have noticed it.

"Okay! Let's climb up there then", Pinky said tagged.

"Let me handle this," I said and put the model aside to haul out a long rope. At one end I quickly tied on a quadruple metal hook.

"Back off a little, please!" I asked the others to do and waved to the left that they should take a few step back. Then I started swinging the hook in my left paw while I focused my eyes on the edge high above us.

"Um, Perry?" Darren said and walked up towards me. "You know, I could just… OUCH!"

A high clang was heard through the mallard's cry when the metal hook hit his bill, and in the corner of my eye I saw the little waterfowl disappear over the edge.

"WAAAAAaaaaaahh…"

"Oh my!" Pinky exclaimed terrified and all four of us immediately turned our heads around and saw the duck falling down towards the woods. He turned around in the air and hastily started flapping his wings.

I let out a sigh in relief when I watched him unharmed fly back up towards us, with a quite grumpy grin on his bill though.

"Ah, he's fine. He can fly", Peter said and waved nonchalant.

The wild drake came up and landed among us without saying a word.

"I'm very sorry, but I _did_ tell you to stay away", I said.

Darren sighed.

"Yeahyeah, whatever. Let's just get back to work", he said annoyed.

"Fine!" I said and started swinging the hook again. I gazed up towards the edge of the cliff, and then threw the hook.

It came a little too high and hit the rock wall and bounced down on the other road. I carefully pulled the rope and hoped that the hook would find a place to get attached to. After a while, I felt something holding against. I pulled harder with all my power to make sure it really was stuck.

"There!" I said and stepped aside to make room for the others. "Who wants to go first?"

"I'll climb filst", Peter said (Why am I not surprised?) and immediately worked his way through the line towards the rope end and began tugging it.

"Yes, if it holds for you, we will know for sure that it will hold for the rest of us", Terry said.

Peter frowned a bit suspicious at the turtle as if he wondered if his words had been some kind of hint of an insult. Terry's serious and oblivious expression seemed to make the panda lower his guard though.

"Yeeaah… Well, see you soon!" Peter said and started pulling himself up.

We all followed him intently with our eyes and got ready to act in case he would fall again, like the time with the tree. He managed to get the whole way up without any trouble though. Then Terry began climbing.

Darren sighed bored by my side while waiting for the turtle to get up.

"You do realize that I simply just could've _flown_ up and tied the rope?" he suddenly pointed out.

…

That had totally slipped my mind.

"Um… yeah… maybe, but… it's not like we always are going to have a flying guy on the team so it's better to already have practiced on using other methods", I made a pitiful attempt to defend myself.

"Yeah maybe", Darren sighed and shrugged.

I let Pinky get up first before I started climbing. Darren stayed behind below for a while until I was almost up, then he flew passed me. He managed to land on the road just a mare second before I grabbed the edge, which I couldn't resist but to, despite the unfair conditions, find slightely annoying.

We continued our journey by following the new path. The higher we got the more difficult it became to see the forest below. We had gotten to the level where our eyes couldn't penetrate through the massive fog anymore. Everything was completely white below and it was impossible to even estimate how high up we were. Not even the model could help us any longer since we had passed the bitten part. (Sigh!)

"Uh-oh!" Terry suddenly said and stopped.

"Can you, please, _stop_ saying 'uh-oh' all the time?" Peter asked irritated. "It's so deplessing."

"What's wrong?" I asked the tortoise.

"Take a look at this!" he said and pointed down on the road we walked on. "Fissures, lots of them. And they are all over the place."

He pointed ahead of us in the direction we were going.

"And look at the wall", he said and pointed at the rock wall to the left. "This part here is jaggier and has a darker colour. That means blocks have come off just recently. The rock is more fragile around here, and with the water from the mist getting in through the cracks there is a big risk for rock avalanche."

I looked down at my own feet and noticed that I was standing on a fairly large crack. Cautiously, I stepped aside inwards to the rock wall.

"We have to walk very careful, and stay close to the wall", I said.

"I suggest that we tie ourselves together the four of us", Pinky said.

"Sounds good," Terry said and nodded.

I took out the rope again (you can never have too much rope with you) and tied one end around my waist. Then I handed over the rest to Pinky, who tied a piece around his before handing it to Terry.

When Peter also had tied the other end around his belly, we all leant our backs against the wall and slowly started walking sideways along the cracked road. I noticed that gravels sometimes came off when I moved my hand over the wall to easier maintain balance. Sometimes, we heard noise of pebbles rolling down the mountain far away. We had enabled our helmet shields in our agent hats just in case boulders would hit our heads.

Larger cracks appeared ahead the further we got, and one time we watched a large portion of the roadside come off and roll downwards.

"I'm usually not scared of heights, but right now I wish we were back on the ground", Pinky said anxious.

"You're not the only one", Darren said and looked over the edge after the gigantic falling boulder that just had been a part of the road.

"Alen't thele any safel load we can take?" Peter asked.

We _could_ have checked that if it hadn't been because _someone_ DESTROYED THE MODEL!

I bit my lower bill hard to prevent the words from leaving my beak.

"I can fly around now and check if you'd like?" Darren offered.

"That would be great. We go and find a relative safe place to take a rest at", Terry said. "It is too dangerous to continue."

"Alright, can anyone of you have his tracker turned on so that I can find my way back to you, in case I'd get lost in the fog?" the mallard asked.

"Yes, of course!" Terry said and began tinkering with his wrist communicator.

"Alright, see ya soon!"

With that said, the wild drake spread out his wings and flew away over the edge. I followed the frantically flapping bird with my eyes and watched him get swallowed up by the mist. The rest of us went back a few feet to a small cave-like inward curl in the mountain that we had passed by earlier. There, we sat down and took a snack while we waited.

I managed to finish my salad sandwich with caterpillars since long without any sign from the duck.

"Ugh, whele _is_ that flying lat?" Peter wondered irritated.

Terry took a look at his wrist communicator.

"Right now, he is on the other side of the mountain", he informed.

Peter groaned loudly.

"Hey! Let's sing something!" Pinky suggested encouraging.

"But come _on!_" Peter complained negatively.

"We can play a game", I suggested.

"YEAH! That sounds fun!" Pinky cried enthusiastic. "Okay, I'm thinking of a person and you'll try to guess who. One clue, it's someone we all know."

"Man, you ale so juvenile", Peter said.

"Okay, I take the first question. Is it a male or a female?" Terry asked, without taking any notice to the panda's comment.

"You're only allowed to ask yes-or-no questions", Pinky pointed out.

"Oh, right! Well, is it a male?" Terry asked again.

"Yes", the dog revealed.

I thought for a moment about what I should ask.

"Hmm… Does he work for O.W.C.A.?"

"Yes, yes he does."

Everyone turned to Peter.

"You can count me out", he said sourly. "I don't want to play youl stupid game."

"Okay, then it is mine turn again", Terry said, not letting himself be discouraged by the grumpy bear. "Hm… Is he… a mammal?"

"Um…"

Pinky thought for a while.

"Yes… he's a mammal."

"Is it PERRY?" the turtle guessed hastily and pointed at me.

Pinky laughed out loud.

"Hahaha, no it's not Perry", he finally revealed.

"Hey! Now you asked two questions!" I remarked picky, but in a funny way. "Then I'll also get to ask twice now. Hm, let's see… Is he an agent?"

The puppy thought for a while again.

"Well… I'm not really sure of that…", he said hesitantly. "He is not being addressed as 'Agent something' at least."

"Then that means he must be one of the other employees, hmm…", I thought loud for myself. "Is he a human by the way?"

"Yes, yes he is."

"Is he an intern?" Terry asked, obviously having a certain person in mind.

"CARL!?" I exclaimed.

"_No_, he's not an intern, and no it's not Carl", Pinky said and laughed again.

"Hmm…", Terry pondered. "He does not happen to be any of the superiors?"

"As in matter of fact, he is", Pinky revealed and smiled secretively.

Wait! Could it be…?

"And he doesn't happen to have a monobrow and a white moustache?" I asked, even though I already had an idea of who it might be.

"He does!"

"MAJOR MONOGRAM!" both Terry and I cried at the same time.

"Correct!" Pinky declared exuberant.

"YAY! Okay, now it's my turn to come up with someone!" I said enthusiastically and began racking my brain. "Hm, let's see… hmm… Oh, I can't come up with anyone!"

"Seliously, how old _ale_ you!?" Peter complained negative. "You'le acting like kids!"

Ugh, does he _have to_ care!

"Um, we are just trying to elate the atmosphere to make the time fly", Terry said calm.

"Do you leally think it's applopliate to play games when we'le located thousand feet above the glound on a place that could collapse at any moment?"

Why can't he just be _quiet!?_

Terry turned on his head and looked around us.

"Um, I do not think we need to fear very much right _here_", he said.

"Well, you don't know fol sule!" the panda said snappish. "I thought you had mole in youl head than that."

"Well, at least _we_ know better than destroying important items during a test."

"I BEG YOUL PALDON!?" Peter shouted indignant.

…

I said that out loud, didn't I…? Oh well!

"I _said:_ AT LEAST _WE_ KNOW BETTER THAN DESTROYING IMPORTANT ITEMS DURING A _TEST!_"

There! I _said_ it!

All three stared astonished at me.

Peter sighed.

"Is this about that stupid model-thing again? Hey, I alleady said I was solly!" he said frustrated. "Do I have to pay fol that fol the lest of my life, ol what?"

"Actually, I consider that!" I said sincerely and walked up to him.

I've had enough now! I just couldn't act nice anymore!

"What is youl _ploblem?_ Leally? You ale totally insane!" the annoying panda said to me.

"Well, is that surprisingly? I've had to listen to _your_ constant whining during this whole trip."

"WHAT THE…!" the bear shouted furiously. He stood up and walked up to me. "HOW _DAL_…!?"

"NO! I don't want to hear any more words coming out of you!" I cried and pushed him backwards. "Ever since this test began you've done _nothing_ but complaining! You _always_ object on things we other say and you always has to speak your opinion. You don't care about what the rest of us think 'cause, _nooo,_ _everything_ has to be done _your _way. You've done _nothing_ but causing us all trouble this whole day!"

"I HAVE NOT!"

"OH YEAH? WELL, PINKY ALMOST GOT BLOWN UP AT THE MINEFIELD BECAUSE OF YOUR THOUGHTLESSNESS!" I reminded him, without really thinking of that I was screaming, and pointed referring at the chihuahua. "DARREN AND I HAD TO RISK OUR LIVES BY THE ALLIGATOR LAKE JUST BECAUSE _YOU_ _"DON'T LIKE SWIMMING"!_"

"Uh, Perry…", Terry made an attempt to cut in, but I just couldn't care any less about what he had to say.

"AND WHEN YOU FINALLY _TRY_ TO DO SOMETHING USEFUL YOU JUST END UP ENDANGERING YOURSELF AND _WE _HAVE TO RUSH IN AND RESCUE YOU!"

I was so upset that I didn't even notice the flapping sound of wing-beats coming towards us until the mallard suddenly landed, a bit stumbling, next to us.

"Hey! Guys! I've got _great _news!" he cried mesmerised. "A bit further ahead, the road is divided into two paths whereof the left one is a lot wider and stabile. It's very steep though, but it's definitely much safer, and it leads all the way up to the top. And guess what, _there _is the_ CAPSULE!_"

Darren suddenly noticed that no one seemed to be very excited but himself and that the atmosphere was quite tense.

"Um, is there something going on here?" he asked and looked a bit wondering at me and Peter.

I sighed and slowly turned back to the panda.

"Peter, I don't know if anybody have ever told you this, but… _you_ are a selfish…"

I started untying the rope around my waist.

"…ungrateful…"

I managed to get up one half of the reef knot.

"…_whiner__!_"

Finally, I threw away the rope behind me and began stomping in the direction to where Darren had told the intersection was.

I couldn't even look at the panda anymore! I was just so sick of him that even the thought of being tied to the same rope as him disgusted me.

Darren looked unbelievably stunned, yet pretty impressed, when I passed him.

"Whoa-oh-_oh!_" he uttered amazed. "Man, you _sure_ put him in his place there…"

"Ah, shut it!" I snapped and pushed the wild drake over the edge.


	5. The Fourth Obstacle - part 2

**5\. The Fourth Obstacle – part 2**

All the frustration within me made that I hardly even noticed the exhaustion in my body when I walked up the steep road. Every now and then, I glanced over my shoulder to see how the other four was doing. They walked a few feet behind me with Terry in the lead and Darren right behind him. Then there was a small gap back to Pinky and Peter, who walked next to each other. Since the road was much wider and much safer here they'd apparently decided to skip the rope as well. I didn't hear whether if they were talking or not, and frankly I couldn't care less about that.

I might have been a little hard on Peter, but I still stood by my word. I really had tried to be nice to him, I really had, but it's hard to be nice to someone who doesn't give anything in return. He hasn't done anything to even try to win my confidence. So why should I even waste my time on giving to someone who would never give anything back?

I guess it's no surprise when I tell that I was never really thrilled about having the panda on the team when our groups were divided in the beginning. I don't think anybody was, except Pinky that is. I just knew he was going to be trouble all along, and I was right.

Suddenly, I heard the sound of rapid footsteps coming towards me from behind. In the corner of my eye I saw Terry panting come up next to me.

"Perry, we can not have it like this…", he said serious.

Oh, let me guess. He had come to try to talk me into to apologize to the panda.

"And why should _I _apologize!?" I wondered snappish. "_He_'s the one who's been acting like a jerk this whole time."

"Perry, this is not all about you", the turtle said.

"No, 'cause it's _always_ about _him_", I said sourly. "He is so egoistic and self-absorbed. Even _you_ think so."

Terry guiltily bit his lower lip a little.

"Well, Peter is not really the most collaborated person", the turtle admitted.

"Exactly!"

"He is more the kind of person that prefers to handle things his own way", he said.

"_Exactly!_"

I couldn't agree more.

"And so does you."

"Exact… Huh?"

The turtle's last words really took me by surprise.

"Do not misunderstand me, Perry", Terry said. "You are great at many things and are one of those agents that have scored highest. But honestly, teamwork has never really been your strongest subject."

I was speechless, I had never really thought of that. Sure I'd have always preferred to try to solve things on my own, but that didn't mean I didn't appreciate others assistance. I just didn't want to have to depend on someone else. The last thing I wanted was that somebody gets hurt just because I can't take care of things myself.

"Well, I… I…"

"I know", the turtle cut me off calmly. "You do not like having to depend on others because you do not want anyone else to have to put themselves in danger because of you."

Am I _that _obvious?

"Perry, you are one of the most caring and protective persons I have met, and even though I appreciate it I have to admit that it sometimes really bugs me."

Even though the turtle's sounded pretty calm and friendly I did notice annoyance in his voice.

"I know you mean well, but you are underestimating the rest of us, while also putting way too much on your own shoulders at the same time. We are your teammates, not your babies. You do not have to do everything on your own. Like by the alligator lake for example, you did not have to risk your life for our sake. We were prepared on that not all of the alligators might have fallen for the decoy so we had made ourselves ready with ammunition to take them on. All _you_ did was putting yourself in unnecessary danger."

"… oh…"

I felt so stupid. I had never even considered that my helpful interventions actually could worsen things.

"You need to learn to _trust_ us, Perry", Terry continued. "The criteria for certificates of this course says, and I quote: "_The purpose of this test is to give the agents the opportunity to demonstrate skill, strength, intelligence and COOPERATION."_ The same goes for Peter. You and Peter have very different ways on working, which is kind of understanding since you are both completely different kinds of animals and have different strengths."

The turtle sighed a little.

"I knew putting you and Peter on the same team would not end up well, but right now we need the both of you if we want to complete this test. We can not have it that two in the group don't get along, it breaks the whole team. We need a strong team to make it all the way to the end. Therefore, I ask you to go over to Peter and clear things up. Not for his sake, not for my sake, but for the sake of the team."

He was right. When I started arguing with Peter, it wasn't just he who got affected. The whole team had had to pay. I can't believe how I could have been so selfish. The last thing that I wanted was that my friends would get hurt because of me, and yet that's exactly what I'd done. How could I be be so stupid!?

No, it was time to put things right. I might have done bad things, but I would not be the kind of guy who won't make up for my mistakes.

* * *

"I nevel apologized to you about what happened at the minefield?" I heard Peter guiltily say to Pinky while I slowly went down to them. Both Terry and Darren walked a little bit behind me.

"Well, I didn't hear anything at all after that explosion", Pinky said frivolous.

"Well, anyhow, I am leally solly. I didn't mean to put you in such dangel", the bear said.

"Oh, no hay problemas!" Pinky assured and waved with his paw. "You know me. Whenever I see a flying object I go all: 'Gotta catch! Gotta catch!' Haha…"

The chihuahua turned silent when they both suddenly caught the sight of me. The happy smile in Pinky's face sank and he glanced uncertain at me. Peter looked very hesitantly.

"Um, hi Peter", I started, a bit sheepishly. "I, uh… ahrm! I would like to apologize for my behavior earlier. I'm sorry for what I said and for yelling. That wasn't very friendly of me, and I'm a platypus enough to admit it."

I could see the smile in Pinky's face slowly widened. Peter's expressionless face, however, was a little harder to tell.

"Folgiven!" he said finally and hastily nodded with his head.

"Well, that went unbelievably swell", Darren, who had stopped right to the left of me, said content.

"I would also like to apologize to you Darren, for pushing you down the mountain", I said to the wild drake.

"Um, are you referring to the time when you hit me with the hook or the time recently when you so _rudely_ pushed me for no reason?" he asked.

"Well, both I guess, but… Hey! Didn't I already apologize to you about the hook?"

"Oh yeah! Yes you did!" the mallard exclaimed, suddenly remembering. "Well, anyway, it's cool bro. I guess we're all a bit extra testy here at this height because of the low oxygen level."

"Um, I would also like to say something, to all of you", Peter suddenly said a bit sheepishly.

We all turned to the bear.

"I… uh, I folgot to thank you all for saving my life when I fell flom the tlee ealliel. Fol that, I am vely glateful."

"Oh, that was nothing! Of course we'd help a friend in need", Pinky said.

"And… and I would also like to apologize if I have behaved badly duling this tlip", Peter continued. "I honestly was nevel awale of that. I'm solly."

Was it possible? Was it possible that I somewhere during my outburst actually managed to get through to him?

"Whoa, whoa, whoa, did I hear correctly?" Darren asked astonished and cupped his wing behind one of his earholes. "_Peter the Panda_ just apol… OUCH!"

I didn't think it was the right time for one of Darren's sarcastic comments so I pinched the duck on the wingshoulder.

"Do you wanna go down the mountain again?" I asked, looking sternly at him.

"Uuhh… Heheh, eh, don't mind me! I-I didn't say anything important", he said, smiling nervously.

"Oh, I'm so proud of you two, and I am so happy that we're all amigos again!" Pinky beamed, slightly teary-eyed. "Everybody! GROUP HUG!"

The exuberant chihuahua rushed up between me and Peter and placed each of his front leg around our shoulders. Darren and I put our arms, a bit reluctant, around each other's shoulders and Terry did so with Darren and Peter. And then we all hugged, a little awkward maybe, but quite cozy.

"Alright, let's go and get that capsule now!" Pinky suddenly decided excited, and so we carried on.

* * *

"WOOHOO! We're here!" the little chihuahua cried happily and ran up the last bit.

"Yeah, that was about time", Peter muttered and panting stepped up to the top platform.

I was completely exhausted. The journey up the mountain certainly hadn't been a walk in the park directly. I had to sit down for a moment to catch my breath once we finally reached the top. Peter and Terry followed my example. Darren and Pinky still seemed to have some strength left though. How is beyond me.

We were now so high up that we actually could see beyond the fog. The white mist beneath us lay like a gigantic cloud around the mountain and it truly was a breathtaking sight. I tried to look for the places we had visited earlier. The alligator lake with the rocky island in the middle was very noticeably, but the minefield was a little harder to find among all the spiky fir trees at distance.

Pinky jumped up on a rock that marked the mountain's highest point, and stretched out his forepaws.

"I'M THE KING OF THE WOOOOORLD!" he cried out loud.

"Alright you majesty, would your highness be so kind and let us borrow your royal paw so we can open the capsule, please?" Darren asked a bit joking and pointed at the red-and-silver box that was attached to a smaller peak behind him.

"Coming!" the chihuahua lilted and jumped down.

We all placed ourselves in a ring around the cliff with the capsule, which reached up to about my waist. Our blurry mirror-images reflected in the silver surface with the black strip cutting off in the middle.

"Okay my friends, after this one we only have one more left to complete this whole challenge", Terry expressed. "If we do our very best and work together there is a big chance that we can make this all the way."

"Yeah, we've already gotten this far, there is no way we can lose!" Pinky said tagged. "After all, we are the best!"

"Yes, we ale the _stlongest!_" Peter said and resolutely placed his wrist over the strip.

"_The_ _fastest!_" Pinky exclaimed, also placing his link over it.

"_The smartest!_" Terry said, going with the flow.

"_The BRAVEST!_" I said.

"_The_… Theee… um… Oh Perry, you stole mine!" Darren said with only his heel lift, racking his brain. "Hmm… The… _The_ _creativ_…est."

And so, he placed his link on the capsule as well.


	6. The Fifth Obstacle

**6\. The Fifth Obstacle**

The fifth clue consisted only of a white paper with four words written on it: 'Third from the top'.

"What does that mean?" Pinky wondered aloud.

"Hey! I think I know!" Darren cried before any of us even got the chance to ponder about it.

On our way to the top, we had encountered a number of cave entrances. Darren's assumption was that the last capsule would be in one of them, the third cave counted from the top.

Since it was the most realistic solution we had, and our only one, we decided to go for it. As you probably know, our 3D-model was still broken so we had to rely on our flight scanning resource again.

The duck managed to locate the correct cave, almost unexpectedly fast, and just a few minutes later, we were all heading into the dark desolate dungeon.

The light from our flashlights danced between the rocky ceilings while we went deeper and deeper into the mountain.

"Ay caramba! My batteries are almost out", Pinky muttered in front of me, tapping his paw on his flashlight, whose shine send out a faint pulsing orange light. "Does anyone have an extra lantern?"

"Oh! I have!" Darren told and immediately took out another flashlight and gave it to the dog. "I always carry an extra with me just in case."

"Hehe, I wonder since when", I said ironic, thinking back on my first cave trip together with the duck.

"How fal in ale we supposed to go?" Peter asked.

"Well, we did not get any directions so I guess all we can do is to keep going until something shows up", Terry said and shrugged.

"Why are you asking? You're not scared, are you?" Darren asked the panda a bit teasingly.

"_Noooo_, I am not _scaled_", Peter claimed a bit offended. "I just want to be sule that we'll be able to find oulselves out again so we won't be stuck hele folevel. Who doesn't want that?"

"Well, so far there has only been straight forward the whole time so right now we don't really have anything to worry about", Pinky said.

Suddenly, I started to feel well-familiar tiny rapid vibrations in my bill.

"Hey! Did you sense that?" I asked the others and stopped hasty.

My four teammates turned around and looked at me puzzled.

"Sensed what?" Darren asked.

Pinky started sniffing in the air as if he was trying to pick up any smell.

"I don't feel anything particular."

"No, not a senct, the electro signals! There's an electric field around here somewhere!" I explained excited. Seriously? I can't believe none of them noticed it.

The gang kept looking at me wondering.

"How do you know that?" Peter asked.

"But, ugh, you just… _feel_ it", I said, starting to get a little irritated. How can they all be so ignorant?

"Feel what? What ale you talking about?" the panda asked, totally bewildered.

"Oh! Right! Platypuses can detect electromagnetic radiation!" Terry exclaimed, suddenly realizing.

"OHHH…! Man, how cool!" Pinky cried understanding, and sounded quite fascinated.

"Wait, what? You mean you _don't?_" I asked surprised.

"Um, no", Peter said, looking at me as if I was a complete idiot.

"Seriously? Not _anyone!?_ Not even _you?_" I asked and turned to Darren, remembering that ducks could sense the Earth's magnetic field.

"Hey, don't look at me, pal. I have no idea of what you're talking about", he said and shrugged while holding out his wings to the sides as if gesturing that he didn't understand.

Sooo… none of them feels tickles in their bills, or well, mouth for some of them, when they get close to electrical appliances!? … Well, you keep learning new things every day.

"But, wait, if there's an electric field around here…", Pinky suddenly said.

"…then that might be a clue to how we can find the last capsule!" Darren concluded realizing.

"Jeez, like nobody thought of that", Peter said sarcastic.

"Do you think you can localize it?" Terry asked me.

"No problem!" I said sure and started searching with my bill along the rock wall to the right without touching it. I felt that the receptors in the left part of my beak were reacting strongest so I went that way. The vibrations got more and more intense the further I got, it was almost irritating.

"It stretches from here to here", I finally informed, holding out my arms along the wall to show how wide the field was. It was big enough for two of us to cover it sideways and it stretched all the way up to the ceiling.

"Do you believe there might be another tunnel at the other side?" Pinky asked excited.

"It is not impossible", Terry said and began looking down around himself as if he was searching for something on the floor. "Do we have anything we can throw at it? A pebble or something?"

"Oh! We can take this!" I suggested and took out the broken spettekaka again.

"Yeah, I don't think we'll be needing that anymore anyway", Pinky said.

We all took a few steps back before I threw the model against the center of the field. Right when it hit, the entire field flickered during a short moment like a TV-screen with a bad image and we managed to get a small glimpse of another tunnel before the clay lump disappeared into it and "the wall" got visible again.

"It's a hologram!" Darren stated the obvious.

"Who are you? The narrator?" I asked ironic.

"Okay, let's go!" Pinky said excited and immediately walked towards the field.

"Uh, maybe we should be a little more care…", Terry tried to urge before the chihuahua disappeared right into the wall.

"…ful."

"Hey! There're lights in here!" the puppy called quite amazed from the other side.

The rest of us followed him in and reunited with the little dog. Indeed, along the both walls, two rows of small blinding lanterns, all of which were connected in series on the same cables, had been rigged. They kind of reminded me of the Christmas lights we used for decoration during the holiday. They actually made me happy.

"This is definitely a work constructed by the agency", Terry said and started walking down the road.

I picked up the spettekaka, which during the meeting with the cave floor had gone in two pieces, before following my teammates.

"Whose wolk would it else be?" Peter asked sarcastic.

"Well, who knows? What if we've just stumbled into a secret tunnel leading into an evil lair belonging to an evil scientist?" Darren joked. "Who knows, we might even find the villain in the end of the tunnel. A long middle-aged skinny man with a hunchback, messy lusterless hair, spiderlike fingers, crazy eyes, a long pointy nose and a creepy voice that hurts your ears…"

"You've got _way_ too much imagination", Peter interrupted him.

In the end of the corridor we got to the entrance of a large dark oblong hall. No lights had been set up there so we lit our torches again and shone in, without stepping over the doorstep. A blinding shine met our eyes when our flashlights were reflected by the metallic capsule, which was placed on a pedestal at the other end of the room. I directed my lamp slowly along one of the longitudinal rock wall. By the ceiling, which was higher than the tunnel's, I noticed several small black gunlike things pointing inwards.

I turned to my teammates, who all apparently also had put noticed to the technological appliances. Without saying anything, I picked up one part of the broken pieces of the 3D-model and looked checking at them. All four nodded in agreement, then I threw the model into the room.

The clump didn't even manage to hit the floor before it was completely destroyed by dozens of dazzling red laser beams. All that was remained of the model piece was dark fine-grained ash that slowly sank to the floor.

"Fire…", I pointed out low.

Pinky sighed nervous.

"Okay guys, we've practice a lot on this kinds of things. Now it's time to prove ourselves", he said determined.

"I'll go first and then you come after when I've reached the capsule", I offered.

"Alright, we can light up the way for you", Darren said and directed his beam at the room floor. The others followed his example.

"Great! Okay, here I go!" I said and walked back a little to make myself ready.

We had gone through several exercises in school on how to get through just these kinds of tasks so I felt pretty calm. I had done very well in those classes.

To prevent any kind of sudden hesitation, I decided to directly rush right into the perilous room, before my brain got the time to start putting ideas into my mind, which could interrupt my focus.

In the corner of my eye, I saw the red rays coming at me and I heard small popping sound behind me when the beams hit the floor. I threw myself forward and made a handspring to mislead the lasers and to increase my speed at the same time. I pushed away with my front feet from the floor extra hard to get high up in the air so I would land properly enough on back paws to do another volt.

Through the fast tumbling sight before my eyes, I noticed how I got closer and closer to the capsule. I saw a red beam diagonally cut my sight from the right just a few inches in front of me and I instinctive bent myself backwards and shuffled in under it with my back feet first. The speed forward made me shuffled on the end along the floor for a while. The friction slowed me down slowly until I gently bumped into the bottom of the podium with my feet.

"Whew! Finally!" I sighed relieved and slowly got up.

"_PERRY!_"

Through Pinky's terrified screams I suddenly heard the sound of a beam coming down right behind me, and felt how the left edge of my tail got subjected to scalding hot heat. I immediately dived over the capsule and hid myself behind on the other side of the podium.

I had thought that the lasers would have stop firing once I had reached the capsule, but apparently I had been wrong.

Glancing up, I saw one of the red laser beams get reflected by the capsules silvery surface and went up and hit the ceiling. I saw another beam coming right at me from the left and I immediately rolled over to the side to avoid it. I quickly went back up on my feet to keep avoiding them more easily.

Apparently, these lasers were incredibly well developed. It wouldn't be enough for us to just avoid them, we have to destroy them.

I got an idea.

"EVERYBODY! MIRRORS!" I shouted to my teammates and picked up my own round pocket mirror and held it in front of one of the firing lasers. The red beam got reflected back to its sender and destroyed it.

I directed the mirror against another laser and did the same thing with that. By the entrance, I saw my teammates rush into the room to help. Terry was smart enough to angle his pocket mirror in a way so that he could make use of the incoming laser to knock out the other laser guns next to it. Darren flew, with his flashlight in his beak, by the same height as the lasers were placed and tricked them to shoot at each other from the opposite side.

Eventually, all the shooting stopped.

"There! I think we got them all now", Terry said, looking up at the broken lasers.

We all gathered by the capsule.

"Whew! That was close", Peter sighed.

"No, _that_ was close", Darren said and affrightedly pointed down behind me.

I had been too busy taking care of the lasers to put much emphasis on the burning feeling in my left tail tip. I lifted my tail up and grabbed it with my forepaws to inspect the red-swollen area that was clearly distinguished from the orange waffle squares.

"Oh my! Perry, are you alright!" Pinky asked appalled.

"Don't worry. The beam didn't cut through, it just scorched the skin a little by the edge", I assured and blew on the irritated stinging area.

Terry came up to take a closer look.

"Hm, no blisters… Then it is just first degree burn", he noted. "Nothing life-threatening."

I blew hard on the swelling, which stinging refused to give in. As soon as I thought that the pain was calming down it immediately flared up again.

"Thanks for the information", I said sarcastic and kept blowing.

"I swear, I am _definitely_ going to report this test! This is _not_ okay!" Darren cried scandalized. "Humans think they can do anything to us just because we're "just animals". No, I am not going to take this any longer. It's time for a revolt!"

"Ah, let's just open the capsule now so we can get the heck out of hele", Peter suggested a bit tired.

"Yeah, let's do that", I agreed and gently let go of my tail back down to the floor. The cold rock surface felt comfortable and cool down the underside of the swollen area. I tried to roll up my tail underneath to let the upper side also touch the floor to make the cold even out a little, which was quite difficult since I wasn't used to move those muscles in that way.

We went and placed ourselves in a circle around the small podium with the capsule.

"Oh, I can't believe this is finally over!" Pinky said euphoric.

"Yeah, if we hurry there's a chance that we can beat Kitty and the others", Darren reminded.

"Yeah, so what ale we waiting fol?" Peter said enthusiastic. "Let's do this!"

"YES!"

We placed our wrist bands, or ankle band, over the magnetic strip and heard the sound of the familiar click.

Suddenly, a loud roar was heard from the other side of the room followed by a big BOOM that made us all jerk. We turned around and directed our flashlight at the entrance. It had been blocked by a big heavy gray metal-door. We were trapped.

"It seems like we spoke a little too soon", Terry uttered.

"Oh, man! Does this _never_ ends?" Darren complained tired.

"Maybe there's a clue inside the capsule on how to get out", Pinky suggested.

Peter opened the canister and took out the paper roll in it.

"The only thing in hele is the map to the lendezvous-point", he informed after he'd rolled it up.

"Oh darn!" Darren uttered discouraged.

"Ah, come on, we've been in worse situation than this before, right?" I tried to encourage them.

For some reason everyone seemed quite hesitantly.

"Um… honestly, I'm not very sure of that", Darren admitted. "I guess it depends a little on how you look at things."

"Well, it is better to try to come up with an escape plan already, instead of just standing here and wait for the oxygen to run out", Terry opined.

"Oh thanks, you just _had_ to lemind me of that as well", Peter said worriedly.

Myself, I was rather quite calm in comparison to my teammates. Breaking out of traps had, after all, been one of the exercises at the academy that I'd been best at. We'd probably be out of here in no time.

We went over to the blocked entrance and started inspecting the large metal gate. Terry tapped on it a little with his knuckle.

"It seems to be made out of very thick material", he stated. "We will not be able to cut it through with our wrist lasers."

I looked thoughtfully up at the edge of the ceiling on the wall to the left.

"What about those?" I asked and pointed at one of the defective lasers.

"But, ugh, we had to destloy those, lemebel?" Peter pointed out weary.

"We can try to fix one of them", I suggested. "Some might still have functional part that we can use to replace the broken part in one of the others."

"That's actually not a bad idea", Darren admitted somewhat impressed.

Terry pensively scratched his chin.

"Hm… well, they _are_ definitely more powerful than our wrist lasers… Okay, let us go for it!"

"Great! There, I told you we'd be out of here in no time", I said proud.

Peter, who stood closest to me, frowned and looked puzzled at me.

"I don't lemebel you saying that", he remarked confused.

"I didn't? Oh! Maybe I just _thought_… You know, nevermind!"

"We better start hurry already!" Pinky suddenly said stressed, and quite anxious, and looked down at his wrist communicator. "The oxygen level is already down at almost _TWENTY PERCENT!_"

"Um, Pinky, that is normal. The Earth's atmosphere consists of seventy-eight percent nitrogen", Terry reminded him calmly.

Pinky looked a bit dumb at him.

"Oh… eh… heh! I… I knew that actually", he muttered embarrassed.

"Alright, I fly up and take them down", Darren offered and flew up and landed right on that specific laser I had pointed at.

The duck directed the flashlight on the laser's tache to the wall, which consisted of a quadrangular metal plate. Then he took out a screwdriver and began to loosen the screw in the metal plate's upper left corner.

"That's going to take folevel", Peter complained.

"Then I guess we have to help out", I said and hauled out the rope again.

I made a loop and tied the one end into a lasso. Then I swung it up around another laser. I pulled the rope so the loop got tightened.

"Let me do that", Peter asked and gently grasped the rope.

I took a few steps back and watched the panda take a more firm grip with his both front paws before pulling hard.

A slight squeak was heard when the tache moved a little, though not enough to make it lose completely.

"We pull together", I said and went back and grabbed the rope.

Peter looked at me and nodded.

"Okay, on thlee. One…", Peter began counting.

"…Two…"

I squeezed the rope tighter.

"_THREE!_"

We both pulled hard together.

A higher squeak was heard and one of the bolts flew off.

"Again!" I said. "One. Two."

"_THREE!_"

This time, the whole rack came off and fell down.

"I'll get it! I'll get it!" Pinky cried eagerly and jumped out in front of us and caught the broken contraption in his mouth.

"Nice going guys!" Darren called from the other side of the room. "Here comes another one."

The mallard flew down, holding the other laser in his feet, and placed it on the floor in the middle. Pinky put down the other beside it.

"Okay, let us take a look here", Terry said and picked up the laser that looked least damaged, the one Darren had taken down. I picked up the other one and carefully peeled off one of the half burnt metal cover plates. Darren shone with his flashlight into my laser's interior, which mostly consisted of a bunch of colorful cables. Terry and I carefully began digging inside the dangerous devices.

"This one looks relative fine, but it needs a new circuit card and a thermo regulator", the turtle informed.

"I've got a circuit card here, but no regulator", I told and began to remove the wires that were connected to the detachable green PCB.

"Then we have to take down mole of them", Peter said and removed the rope that was still tied around the laser I was holding.

We had to take down three more before we finally found everything we needed to fix our laser. While we were at it, we also took the opportunity to do some changes so the device wouldn't detect moving objects and accidently shoot anyone of us. We also connected so that the beam would shoot continuously rather than gradually, like it had done before.

"There! Now, all we have to do is to fire it off against the door and then we're out", I said satisfied and lifted up the patched device, which was about as big as Darren's body and probably weighed a few pounds. I leaned it towards my hip, with the pointer facing the metal gate, while I, a little fumbling, tried to connect the two last cables to each other that would make the thing fire.

"Do you want any help?" Pinky offered.

"No, I'm okay", I assured and finally managed to get the two reddish copper ends to touch each other. A thick red beam shot away from the pointer and almost made me lose my balance due to the backward going force. I quickly twisted the wires to each other and then I took a firmer hold of the machine.

I made sure that it was aiming for exactly the same point in the gate the whole time.

"Um, it doesn't seem to do any damage", Pinky pointed out a bit anxious.

"Of course it does, see", I said calm and turned the beam a little to the side to show off the dark hole in the door. Or, was that just the metal that had blackened somewhat…?

I turned back the ray to the specific point again, leaving another smaller blackened mark next to it.

I stared focused on the point for a long time. The bright light from the beam made a long purplish blinding mark on my retina that lit up every time I blinked.

I felt the temperature in the room rise due to the laser heating up the metal. I puffed a little and wiped the sweat from my forehead just below the hat width, carefully without moving the device.

"PERRY, YOU HAVE TO STOP!" Terry exclaimed suddenly.

"But we're almost through", I remarked.

"NO, YOU'RE NOT, AND YOU NEVER WILL!" Terry exclaimed. (Since when did Terry start to use contractions?) "WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE TO THE HEAT BEFORE THAT BEAM HAS REACHED THROUGH!"

The turtle suddenly grabbed my shoulder hard. I turned my head at him wonderingly.

"AND THE PERSON THAT'S MOST LIKELY GOING TO GO FIRST WILL BE _ME!_" he said.

I stared straight into the turtle's wide eyes. I don't think I've ever seen my scaly friend being so scared as now. Right! I totally forgot! Turtles are poikilothermous and very sensitive to sudden extreme temperaturs!

What have I done? How could I've been so reckless!?

Within less than a second, I had already put the laser on the cave floor and feverishly tried to tore the two wires apart to turn the machine off, but to my horror, it was as if the two copper wires had been welded to each other. Desperate, I instead began to look around for something to smash the device with. The closest thing I found at hand was the flashlight Darren was holding, and I immediately snatched it away from the wild drake's thin wing feathers. I raised the black shining plastic rod over my head and wildly smashed the laser with all my power.

Both lights went out.


	7. The Final Obstacle

**7\. The Final Obstacle**

"It's all my fault! _I_ came up with the _stupid_ idea!" I cried, and placed my sweaty forehead in my both front paws in despair while stressfully strolling back and forth inside the room that was heating up like a large oven.

Upset, I kicked hard at the capsule podium, which I unawarely had walked up to. I didn't even feel the pain spreading through my foot, _that_ angry was I.

"Can you, _please_, _stop_ blaming yourself?" Terry, who weakly where sitting on the floor a few feet away by the wall, asked annoyed. "It was _not_ your fault. We all agreed on the plan."

"Yeah well, if hadn't been for me we wouldn't have been in this situation right now", I said, feeling the tears starting to work their way through beneath my lower eyelids.

This was a disaster! We were all going to die to overheat, all because of me. Except Terry, who's going to dehydrate _and_ _starve_ to death long before us since he's a turtle.

"How do you feel?" Pinky asked Terry, who sat next to him.

"Ugh, my metabolism is going crazy and my heart is beating too fast", the tortoise groaned. "Are you sure we do not have any more food left?"

"Dude, you just ate my sandwich, you can't possibly still be hungry", Darren, who were standing a few feet in front of them, said bewildered. "I didn't even got to taste it."

"It's not his fault he can't regulate his own body temperature", Pinky pointed out.

"Ugh, right now, I really wish I were a mammal", Terry groan, tiredly hanging with his head.

"Pooh! Believe me, you'le not missing out on much", Peter, sitting next to Pinky, said while waving himself with a Chinese hand fan, which he had brought with him for some reason.

"Would you like some water?" Pinky asked the turtle and held out one of the water bottles to him.

Terry glanced a bit suspicious at it.

"How warm is it?" he asked.

Pinky unscrewed the stopper and carefully put one of his front toe in it.

"Um, finger warm I'd guess", the chihuahua adopted.

"Finger warm!? That is _way_ too hot!" Terry exclaimed and recoiled from the bottle as if it was poison in it. "Any water temperature over 30 degrees can kill me!"

"30 degrees? Isn't that ice?" Darren asked confused.

"He meant 30 deglees _Celsius_, you molon! Not Fahlenheit!" Peter enlighten annoyed. "Though, I leally wouldn't have minded some ice light now."

"How many degrees in Fahrenheit is…"

"86", Terry told before Pinky even got the chance to finish his sentence.

"Oh", Pinky uttered commiserative.

"_I_'d like some watel on the othel hand", Peter said.

"Hey! We need to save that for emergences", Darren remarked.

"And exactly _what_ would you call this?" Peter asked while Pinky slowly handed him the bottle.

"Do you really think the agency will let us all die?" the chihuahua asked sad.

"Sadly, I am starting to believe that", Darren sighed.

Pinky sighed.

"Poor Isabella."

"I don't get it", Peter said suddenly wondering while putting back the stopper on the bottle again after finish drinking. "I thought the test would be ovel aftel we had opened the last capsule."

"Well, the description only mention five _stations_, not five _obstacles_", Terry pointed out.

I turned my head towards the large metal door, which looked like it was swaying because of the hot fumes coming out from it. I hated it really. I hated it more than anything. No! There's _one_ thing that I hated even more. Myself. _I_ was the one who had caused all this.

I thought of Phineas and Ferb, I was never going to see them again. I thought back on the moment this morning when I had watched them both leave for school. Who would have thought that that would be the last time I would ever see them? Still, I felt sorrier for them than about me. After all, _they_ were the ones that were going to have to deal with me being gone.

I dug my hand into the fur by my neck and felt the web-foot shaped pendant around my collar. I took it off and opened it to look at the pictures of my two little boys inside it.

"Well my friends, I tell you, as an agent this sure wasn't the way I had pictured how my life would end", Darren suddenly said sighing. "Burned to death trapped in a cave. It's actually quite humiliating when you think of it."

"It was actually in a quite similar way of how the fate of the crew of what was supposed to have been the very first manned moon mission ended. And they were not even in space", Terry suddenly told. "It was under a preliminary test inside the spacecraft, a fire started in the command module due to a short circuit. Since the air in the cabin consisted of pure oxygen, the fire spread quickly and caused such a big overpressure in the module that the astronauts could not open the door to get out. All three crew members died in less than five minutes."

"Okay, can you guys _stop_ being so negative?" Peter asked, almost upset, and suddenly stood right up. "No one hele is going to die! We'le going to get out of hele if it so is the last thing I do!"

"It might actually _be_ the last thing you do", Darren mentioned low.

"Well I don't know about you, but at least _I_'m not going to just sit alound hele and dwell", the panda said determined. "It isn't ovel until it is ovel!"

With that said, the bear went away and began inspecting the cave wall at the other side of the room.

"I never thought I would say this, but I agree with him", Darren said, quite surprised.

"Yeah, I'll go and collect all our equipment appliances. You'd think _one_ of all these tools would be able to help us", Pinky said and directly began walking around to all of us to gather all of our gadgets, then he placed them all down in the middle of the room by the stuffs from the broken lasers we'd taken down earlier.

While the chihuahua desperately tried to figure out what all the things could be used for, Darren slowly went over to the burning hot door, ponderingly scratching his chin.

"Hm, if we would have had enough water with us we could have tried to cool down the metal, then heat it up again, then cool it down and so on until it eventually cracked", he uttered.

"We would all alleady had been suffocated by the steam by that time, stupid!" Peter pointed out.

"Huh? I-I know that. It wasn't a suggestion, I was just… thinking loud", Darren claimed.

"_Too_ loud", Peter muttered and turned back his attention to the wall again.

Even though they all did their biggest attempt to try to keep the spirit up it was obvious that none of them had any idea of what to really do.

Sighing, I went over and sat down next to the ill Terry, who noticeably got weaker and weaker. He's without doubt the one that had the toughest among us right now.

"Nothing's really the same right now", I mumbled hopeless.

Terry snickered a little.

"Are you kidding? Pinky is restless, Darren and Peter are arguing and you are taking on too much responsibility. If you would ask me, I would have said that everything is pretty much the same."

Terry suddenly cringed and let out a painful groan. Then, to my horror, he leaned diagonally backwards with the backside of shoulder against the wall behind us and started breath heavily.

"Not for _you_ it isn't", I said, forcing myself to not start panicking. I had to think straight.

I picked up Peter's hand fan that he had left on the floor and rashly started waving it in front of the tortoise's face. I didn't know if it would help or not, but I had to do _something_. He _needed_ to be cooled down!

The exhausted turtle didn't react to the breeze.

This is bad. Really bad!

I heard footsteps behind me.

"Terry?" Pinky said, highly anxious.

"Do not mind me, keep try to work on a way out of here", the tortoise gruelingly told him to.

"I stay with him", I assured, turning to the chihuahua.

Pinky worriedly nodded comprehending before he a bit reluctantly walked back to the pile with stuff again.

"You should go over and help them, instead of watching over me", Terry suddenly mumbled.

"What's the point of that? I've already messed up enough", I reminded him depressed. "It's better for everyone if I just stay out of the way."

My arm was getting tired of all the waving so I lowered the fan.

Terry glared irritated at me with his eyelids half open.

"If I would not have been so tired right now I seriously would have _slapped_ you!" he suddenly hissed. "What happened was _not_ your fault so stop feeling sorry for yourself! The Perry _I_ know would never let himself be discouraged just like that. He would always keep fighting, no matter how rough the case is. If this really is my last time on Earth, the least you can do is to bring _that_ Perry back. The Perry who is my _friend._"

In the corner of my eye, I suddenly noticed that Peter, who now was inspecting the wall near Terry and I. He placed his little black round ear against the rocky surface and knocked on it a few times.

"Exactly _what_ are you doing?" Darren asked the panda wondering.

"I'm tlying to listen if thele's another way on the othel side", he informed. "If so, we could tly to dig oulselves ovel thele to get out. We do have pickaxes with us."

The panda made a nodding gest towards the pile in front of Pinky.

"So… y'found anything yet?" Darren asked doubting.

"No", Peter sighed. "The only close tunnel alound hele is the same one as we came flom."

The bear pointed at the big door at the other end of the room.

"Yeah, and sadly that one is being blocked by an enormous scrap of metal, and the picks won't work on that", Darren mentioned.

Suddenly, it hit me like a slap in the face (which Terry ironically just had wanted to give me).

I slowly lifted my head, looking towards the gigantic metal gate.

Could this really work? Would it be possible…?

"Maybe… that's not a big problem…", I said and without really thinking about it I stood up slowly.

"What do you mean?" Darren asked.

"Well, you see, only the _door_ is made of metal", I told, feeling the excitement rise within me more and more, "but the wall _around _it is just _rock!_"

In the weak light from the torches, I watched my teammates getting struck by exactly the same thought as I.

"You're saying that instead of trying to break _through_ the gate we should try to hack _around_ it?" Darren asked checking.

"EXACTLY! So what are we waiting for? Let's get out of here!" I resolutely exclaimed and rushed towards the entrance, picking up one of the hoes from the pile on the way.

"He's back", I thought I heard Terry mumble happy.

As soon as I got to the door I immediately started hoeing the wall to the left, right by the edge of the hot gate. Small pebbles got loose and flew off when the pick cut into the rocky surface. The hoe got stuck in the crack the first time so I had to wiggle it a little it before I could make the next chop.

It took me a few more strokes before I suddenly realized how worn out I got. In all the excitement, I'd almost forgotten about the dangerously high heat, which by the way was even more powerful close to the door. I suddenly felt as if I was about to faint.

Exhausted, I lowered the hoe with the metallic bent part on the floor and leaned my head over the helve. I gasped so hard that my lungs hurt.

"Back off, will you?" I suddenly heard Peter say behind me.

I got up a bit unsteadily and wobbled to the side. Peter gently took the heavy tool away from me and proceeded on making the crack in the wall larger.

I backed farther away from the heat radiating door and sat down on the floor to rest, taking a slurp from the water-bottle.

The hole was still too small to let more than one of us to work on it. Peter kept on digging for a few minutes.

"Pooh! Okay, I'm out fol now", he said tired and put down the hoe, letting it lean against the wall, before walking away from the door, wiping the sweat from his wet forehead.

"Well, I guess it's my turn then", Darren said and went over to pick up the hoe, which was taller than he.

He fumbled a little with it before finally hurling the heavy blade against the wall, losing his balance under its weight in the process. The wild drake accidently swayed over to the right. Trying to prevent from falling over he leaned towards the the gate, something he immediately regretted.

"OUCH! OUCH! Hothothothothothot…!" he moaned and immediately jumped away from the hot iron in some kind of weird dance, dropping the pick in the meantime.

"Stop fooling alound you buffoon! We don't have all the time in the wolld", Peter said stressed.

I glanced at Terry behind us and noticed that the turtle had closed his eyelids and struggled to breath.

"_I_ keep going instead", Pinky offered and picked up the pick to continue the work.

Even if the all four of us would have been able to hack together at the same time we all realized that it still would take a long time before we had cut through completely. Time we don't have…

"This is taking too long", I finally said.

"Yeah, don't we have anything we can try to blow up the hole with instead?" Darren, who again had gone back for another try to hack, wondered.

"I'll check!" Pinky offered and eagerly walked over to the pile of stuff again.

"That is _fal_ too dangelous", Peter objected. "The whole loom can collapse, and the extla heat is going to give mole fuel fol the explosion."

"I'm not talking about dynamite, just something small so it gets easier to hack", Darren said. "Besides, I think we're in big trouble already."

"How about the warning grenades?" Pinky suggested and held up one of the mini grenades, similar to the one I had used at the minefield earlier. (Man, that felt like a long time ago.)

"Yes! Those are perfect!" I cried.

The chihuahua went back to us with one of the small grenades in his paws. Darren pulled away the loose gravels from the hole with his wing to make room so Pinky could place the tiny bomb there.

"Okay, everybody ready?" the puppy asked and took a proper grip around the sprinter. We all nodded in assurance. "Alright, then RUN!"

Right after Pinky had pulled, everybody quickly ran over to the other side of the room where Terry was.

The floor shook a little when the relative big bang was heard behind us. Peter had been right about that the heat would increase the blast.

We turned around and noticed through the small cloud of dust that the hole had become significantly larger.

"WOOHOO! IT WORKED!" Darren cheered happy.

The hole was now big enough that two of us could work on it at the same time. I picked up another pick from the pile and kept on hacking together with Darren.

We had by now managed to dig so deep that we could get a reasonably hint on how thick the metal door was. With hindsight, it was no wonder the idea with the laser didn't have worked.

"I see light!" Pinky, who had taken over the hacking after me and Darren together with Peter, suddenly cried blessed.

He was right. Through a small hole in the rock of the chopped area near the metal edge, a small glimmer of light flowed from the lamps in the tunnel on the other side.

"YES! Finally!" Darren exclaimed.

"Did you hear that Terry? We're almost out!" I cried to the turtle a few feet away. He had by now lied down with his flat belly spread over the stone floor.

"Terry?" I said worry when the non-moving tortoise didn't respond. Uh-oh…

I immediately started walking over to the dehydrated reptile.

"Come on! Let's continue!" I heard Peter say behind me, and then I heard he and Pinky keep on cutting stone.

"Terry, are you awake? We see light!" I told him encouraging and lightly smacked him on the dry cheek, hoping that he would react. No reaction.

No… please, NO! Not now when we're so close!

"We gotta get him out of here quickly", Darren, who I hadn't noticed was standing just behind me, said serious.

I lifted one of the turtle's foreleg and placed it around my neck. Darren did the same with the other one, and then we both carried him over to the exit. Pinky and Peter had already managed to enlarge the hole to the size that at least Pinky and Darren probably would be able to squeeze through.

"I climb out and keep hacking from the other side", Pinky suggested after a couple of more cuts and then crawled through the hole with his head first. Peter handed him the pick after he had gotten out.

They kept working on a big part that blocked the top of the hole. In the end, the big piece finally loosened and the big boulder rolled down on the floor into the tunnel on the other side. A large flow of light poured into the room.

"Thele! WE'LE FLEE!" Peter exclaimed joyful and relieved. Then he stepped over the lower edge out of the room.

He and Pinky helped out on the other side when Darren and I regardful led the limbless turtle to freedom. Then the two of us also finally could get out of the room. Since we were still pretty close to the door the temperature wasn't really at much difference yet.

"Pooh! Alright guys, let's hit the road now!" Darren said.

"Yes, I _nevel_ want to see this place again", Peter said and helped me supporting Terry.

"Wait! Did we bring the map by the way?" Pinky asked.

"I got it", Darren assured.

"Alright, then let's go!" I said resolutely, and then we all started running through the enlightened tunnel.

* * *

"Ughuhugu…"

That was probably the most beautiful word I had ever heard the turtle utter.

As soon as we had started to approach the end of the cave and it got cooler, Terry immediately began waking up. Darren had flied down to the forest to get some cold water so that we were able to cool down the turtle's dry skin.

"How are you, amigo?" Pinky asked him where he sat leaning against the rock wall in a puddle of water. He slowly opened his eyes and squinted at us.

"Much better, thank you", he announced and smiled. "Great job guys! I knew you could do it!"

He lifted his foreleg and proudly made a thumbs up at us.

"Welcome back, old friend!" I said. I was so happy and relieved that I almost started to cry.

"Can you walk on youl own?" Peter asked.

"Yes, I think so", Terry said and carefully stood up.

"Alright! Great! Then let's head for the finish line", Darren said.

Our final stop was right by the end of the forest. Getting there was pretty much uneventful and went on without any problems, something I was glad for.

"There! I see it!" Pinky suddenly cried and pointed in front of us. "And there is Admiral Acronym and Major Monogram!"

"Awesome! Let's sprint the last way!" Darren suggested psyched up and we all immediately began rushing towards the finish line.

"Look! We're almost there!" another voice suddenly cried from the trees to our left. Then we saw Kitty and her teammates step out on the road in front of us. As soon as our eyes met, they all immediately started running at full speed.

"Oh no you don't!" Darren said determined. Then he stretched out his wings and flew up passed us, thus immediately taking the lead.

"Hey! You're cheating!" Owen called and flew after him.

"_You_'re one to talk!" the duck cried to him.

The owl smoothly sailed up behind him and tackled the mallard from the side.

Lots of feathers were spread out in all directions when the two birds wildly wrestled in the air before they both finally crashed down into a bush by the side of the trail.

When the two flyers were out of the race, it was now Pinky who held the lead, quickly outrunning Danny behind him. I was a few feet behind Danny.

"I'm winning! I'm winning!" the chihuahua cried excited, running on all fours paws.

"We'll see about that!" Danny said. Suddenly, the brown dog picked up a stick from the ground and threw it aside over the chihuahua's head.

"PINKY, _NO!_ BAD DOG!" I shouted, but too late. The small puppy lifted his bat-like ears and headed for the flying object into the bushes.

"I'll get it! I'll get it!"

"That was unfail played!" Peter called displeased at Danny. He was running right behind me.

"I don't recall that we had any rules", Danny pointed out, turning his head and smirked at us.

"Oh! Well, in _that_ case…"

The panda suddenly pulled out a long pole from his package and held it out right in front of the brown dog's leg, making him trip and pitch forwards.

I saw my chance and moved up a gear past the dog, my sights on nothing but the finish line. Just a few steps more…

"Not so fast, mister!" Kitty suddenly cried and grabbed my upper arm. Then she tried to push me backwards to get in front.

"Oh no you don't!" I said determined and clenched on to the feline's shoulder.

She tried to quickly shake me off by trying to elbow me in my stomach, as well as I was trying to shoo her backwards at the same time. The rash movements made the cat losing her balance to the side, which caused her to accidently making me trip over her feet, which ended in that we both fell forward, right over the finish line.

As I looked up from the ground I saw Major Monogram standing right before us.

"Perfect! Two teams at the exact same time!" the Major said content and scribbled down something on the block of paper he was holding. "Good job agents!"

As Major Monogram went over to exchange a few words with Admiral Acronym Kitty and I got up on our feet.

"Woohoo! We won!" Kitty exulted complacent.

"What!? C'me on, I totally bet you with a whole bill-length", I objected.

"You did not!"

"Did!"

"Who gaht first?" Tucker suddenly asked behind us, who'd just made it over the finish line together with the rest of both teams.

"I DID", both Kitty and I said at the same time. "NO, _I_ DID!"

"Hello mates! So, you finally made it", Karen the Kangaroo suddenly said, appearing right next to us along with Herman the Hedgehog, Manny the Mongoose, Clara the Chicken and Rocky the Raccoon.

"Um, yeah… How long have you guys been here?" Kitty asked quite surprised.

"We got here about twenty minutes ago", Herman informed.

"Oh… I see", Darren uttered a bit disappointed.

"Ale we the last ones?" Peter wondered.

"No, we're still waiting for few groups more", Manny told.

"They're serving food by the bus, by the way", Rocky suddenly informed.

"Oh! Wonderful!" Pinky said upward.

"Yes, I am hungry", Terry said content.

We all went over to the bus, which would take us back to the academy later, and noticed that a lot of sandwiches had been placed out on a park table right outside it. Yum-yum!

"So, shall we call it a tie?" Sergei suggested.

"Yeah, I guess so", Pinky said and shrugged content.

"Well, we _would_ have won if it hadn't been because of that Peter ate our map", I said, pretending to sound a bit grumpy.

The agents from the other teams looked quite puzzled at us. Then they all laughed.

"Bwahahaha! Seriously!? Is that _true?_" Kitty asked.

"Urgh! You just _had to_ emballass me, didn't you?" Peter groaned at me unamused.

"Ah, Darren would probably have told them about that sooner or later anyway", I pointed out nonchalantly.

"That's right!" the duck confirmed from faraway.

We each took a sandwich and a juice box and sat down by the table.

"Okay, you just _have_ _to_ tell us _everything_ you've gotten through", Kitty said exited.

"Yeah! I wanna hear about your adventure as well", I said ecstatic.

"Ugh! Do we have to?" Peter asked tired. "To be honest, I just want to folget the whole thing."

"I hear you, dude. I don't know _which_ part of this test that has traumatized me _the least!_" Darren mentioned upset. "Almost all the obstacles we got were far too dangerous and should be banned!"

"I agree, if it hadn't been for the safety program I would have _sued_ the agency", Manny said.

"Safety program?" Darren repeated confounded.

"Oh, right! You see, the wristbands we got are programmed with a special health meter that can sense the holder's condition", Karen explained and held up her own light-blue strap around her wrist. "If the meter ever would get down to critical level, the device would immediately teleport the user away to safety, though that would also mean that everyone on the team would have to retake the test."

"And to really be on the safe side, the agency also had dozens of cameras set up that have followed our every step throughout the test", Herman added. "And the best part is… _we get to watch them later!_ So you don't have to tell the story about how everything went, 'cause were still going to get to watch it all anyway."

"Really…", I uttered, not sure about how I felt about that.

"Wait, it did not say anything about that in the descriptions", Terry suddenly pointed out confounded.

"No, that's because the agency wanted to be able to grade your actions as good as possible", Karen explained.

"Well… that kind of makes sense I guess", Owen said.

"Yeah, it makes sense to why no one has ever turned in any complains about this test _earlier_", Darren said, still a bit displeased. "Though, I still think some parts of the test should be re-considered."

"Ah, shut up and eat youl sandwich instead", Peter told him to.

Suddenly, Rocky, who had gone inside the bus earlier, came out with a couple of stacked CDs around his front claw.

"Hey! Anybody want to take a look at the recordings?" he asked.

"Um…", Danny mumbled a bit hesitantly.

"YES! Let's watch! I can't wait!" Pinky cried excited and restlessly jumped up from the bench to help the raccoon with bringing over a computer to the table.

"Well, I guess it's better to get over with all the humiliating things already", Clara muttered low. "This is one of the downsides with being an agent. No private life."

Pinky placed the laptop on one of the rectangular table's short sides so we all could see, and then he started it up.

"Whose team are we going to watch first, you think?" Rocky asked.

"I think we should start with the team that got here first", Owen said.

"YES! I think that's a very good idea!" I quickly said.

"Okay then", the raccoon said and pushed one of the shiny DVDs inside the computer's disc slot.

We all cuddled up closer to the laptop so we all could get a good look at the screen.

"Okay, is everybody ready?" Herman, who sat closest to the computer, asked.

"Yes!"

"Alright! Then it's _movie time!_" he said before pressing play.

_**The End**_


End file.
